Leaving
by SJlikeslists
Summary: It's forty years later when someone decides it is time to write a new history of the last war.  Using the former Luna Lovegood for source material wasn't her first choice, but she'll work with what she's got.
1. Prologue

Disclaimer: Harry Potter isn't mine.

Note: This story is dedicated to MJ. "I don't understand," I said. "I don't either. Why don't you write a story to explain it to the both of us?" She replied. Thus, this happened. The answer to our confusion is in there. It is tucked somewhere among all the plot bunnies and people that were insisting upon having their own way.

Prologue

7 January 2038

Adrienne,

It was an unmitigated disaster. I am not even sure what went wrong. It all went so badly so fast. We were sitting there at dinner and I was thinking "Oh my goodness, it is really them" and "How did I ever pull this off" one minute. The next minute they were making their excuses and leaving. I do not know what I did wrong. It seemed to be going so well. Mrs. Weasley was even gushing about what a wonderful idea the project was and saying something about how such an overly neglected subject like History of Magic needed to be revamped so that it would appeal to a greater number of students as they went through Hogwarts. She said that it would help maintain a proper sense of history in our youth. Mr. Weasley seemed to think that was funny for some reason.

Anyway . . . They liked it. They liked the idea. They thought it was a good one. I thought it was a done deal. I was even starting to relax. Then, everything just suddenly changed. There is no way I am going to get them to participate now. I am thinking it may have had something to do with my explanation of the process. Ms. Smith was right. I should have just kept my mouth shut. The words "something like a Quick Notes Quill" came out of my mouth, and I swear the temperature in the room dropped 15 degrees. I should have known. I should have done what she told me and just hooked them on the project. I should have let her do the process explanations. She thought I would mess them up. I just was not certain that she was going to explain it correctly. I mean you have heard me talk about how she exaggerates or glosses over things by turn. I was afraid she might not explain fully. I thought that it would not be fair to them if they did not completely understand. I was wrong. I muddled it all up royally. They just seemed so ready to listen, and it is my idea after all. I should have let someone who is better at dealing with people handle it.

Ms. Smith is going to kill me. Then, she will probably resurrect me just to fire me. Oh Adrienne, what am I going to do? She was only sold on the project because of them. If I don't have them to pull from . . . Where do I go from here?

Sadie

8 January 2038

Nat,

I'm talking to you because you are the kinder, more understanding of my editors. I'm not ready to go anywhere near Constance with this one yet. In case you have not deduced so from that opening, I have bad news.

I got the interview – with all four of them together. It seemed to be going well. They liked the idea, but they are not going to do it. I blew it. Now I do not know what to do. It was going to be so perfect. There is no way that Constance is going to let me go ahead without the four of them. There is no one else. They are "The Trio" and Ginny Weasley. Who else am I going to get to get the funding for this? To get this pulled off? It is so important.

I cannot just let it die. I will think about what other options I have and get back to you in the morning. I just wanted to let you know so that you do not get blind-sided if Constance is on a tear to have me fired tomorrow.

Sadie

8 January 2038

Dear Sadie,

I have known you for some time now, and I know you're better than that. Don't give up so easily. Your original plan for your idea may have fallen through, but that doesn't make the worth of the idea itself any less. You're a Ravenclaw. You're a bright girl. Think of some other way to make it work. Pull it off. And don't let Constance bully you.

Nat

8 January 2038

Sade,

Oh my goodness! You actually got an interview with "The Golden Trio Plus One." How cool is that? They never grant interviews. Stop beating yourself up! If nothing else, think of the columns you could write for the _Daily Prophet_ on your experience at dinner. I know, I know. You're a serious book author – not a newspaper reporter. I've heard the spiel many times. My point is that this was a wonderful opportunity. Even if it didn't turn out the way you planned, that doesn't make it any less wonderful. Think of all the kids in the world that we grew up with who would have killed for a chance to do what you just did.

I've got faith in you, Sadie. You're brilliant. You know you are, so go out and fix it. Besides, everybody grew up hearing their stories. Think of someone different – someone who was on the sidelines but still kind of in the middle of everything (if that makes any sense at all). Maybe that's the way you should go. Use some different perspectives. It could work. See what you can do with it.

Adrienne

9 January 2038

Dear Constance Smith,

I wanted to let you know, Ms. Smith, that after initial interviews in preparation for the project that we have previously discussed, I feel that the subjects mentioned are part of an over studied direction. In order for these text reforms to have maximum impact, I feel that the focus should switch to some secondary participants in the war. I am looking at Mrs. Luna Scamander, Mr. Neville Longbottom, and various other members of the original DA. I am quite sure that the introduction of these lesser known stories will improve the quality of the educational content.

If, as you have suggested, the publishing house decides that general release biographies are a better use of the information, these less told stories should help to pique interest and boost initial sales. I just wanted to keep you updated – thank you so much for your attention to this project.

Sincerely,

Sadie Creevey

11 January 2038

Dear Miss Creevey,

I'm disappointed that you opted to trash an entire quarter's worth of build up work on a project just because you decided that that was not what the readers really wanted. Please spare me a reiteration of how you intend this project for a textbook. You know that is a decision that will be made by the executive board when the book is ready for editing. Until such time as that decision is made, you would do well to remember that I am here to give you advice on how to keep the topic widely distributable.

Listen to what I am telling you. Sadie dear, you don't know what the readers want. You're good with a quill – I'll give you that. You've got the brains to do some serious writing. You could go far (especially with this pensieve charm of yours) in this industry, but you're going to have to stop being so rash. I know what the readers want. That's why I'm here. Two bit has beens who teach at Hogwarts showing off their old DA coins to anyone who will listen to their far overdone war stories is not what we had in mind. Think of something better, or I'll take the project from you.

Constance

11 January 2038

Sade,

Hey! I'm going to be up to London tomorrow for work. Since I'll be in town, I thought we might be able to meet up for dinner? I'll take you for ice cream after. Hope to see you then.

Drake

11 January 2038

Dray,

Normally I would like nothing better than to catch up with you (and eat ice cream), but I'm kind of in the middle of a huge disaster at work. The if I don't get it cleared up, I'm going to be the one serving the ice cream kind. I'm sorry. Maybe next time?

Sadie

11 January 2038

Sade,

No problem. I understand you have to work. Just don't get too stressed out about it. It's not good for you. Besides, if you were the one serving the ice cream, you would probably also be getting free samples. That wouldn't be all bad, now would it? I'll see you next time I'm up.

Drake

12 January 2038

Dear Mrs. Scamander:

I know you have no idea who I am, and you probably receive thousands of letters in the course of a year. This one is different. I am not demanding an autograph or writing accolades on you career – although you do deserve them.

My name is Sadie Creevey. I am a recent graduate of Hogwarts School of Withcraft and Wizardry where I, like you, was in Ravenclaw House. I am working in book publishing, and I have taken an interest in revising the History of Magic curriculum. As you know, it is woefully outdated. I feel it is important that the students be exposed to some more recent history. After all, forewarned is forearmed, and our best defense against the mistakes of the past being repeated is to make sure that our children know what those mistakes were. I was hoping that I might receive your help in this matter.

I am proposing writing a series of books, semi-biographical in nature with the perspectives of various people who participated in the fight against Voldemort. I am hoping that the personal focus will help students who are not naturally inclined toward a study of history to gain a better grasp on the content. You are one of the people that I should like to write about. I was wondering if you would be interested in providing some personal details to the story.

Everyone knows the general points, Mrs. Scamander. We know what was put in the newspapers at the time. We know the near legends that have been passed through our society, but only those of you who were there can tell us what it was really, truly like. You are the ones that can tell us what the warning signs were. You are the ones who know what it was like to live in a time when you did not know if your family and friends were going to be there the next time you came to see them. We need to know that. We need to not lose that sense of what can happen when we become lax in our viligiance against wrong.

On a personal note, I know how hard this subject can be to retell. I respect that you may choose not to relive moments that were probably painful. My own uncle died in the Battle of Hogwarts, and my father cannot bring himself to discuss it. My best friend during my Hogwarts' years only found out that her father had been an original member of the DA during a conversation with Professor Longbottom after Herbology class one day.

Everyone thinks that they are giving us a chance to grow up in a world that is less dark than the one in which they had to live. I understand what they are trying to do. But for those of us who are the children and grandchildren of that time, it is difficult. We have a disconnect from them because we do not understand what they went through. We do not understand why it was so important to fight against what was happening that they had to give up a part of their childhood. We do not understand why we hear stories of the things they did from strangers instead of their own lips. We do not understand, and I am afraid that makes us take everything far too lightly. We need to know. We need to understand. We need to not be shielded into complacency. Our grandchildren will be the ones who pay the price for that.

I apologize if I have begun to ramble somewhat, but this is very important to me. Please, think about it. If you decide that you are interested, please let me know by return of owl. I will be happy to answer any questions you may have and to provide you with further details. Thank you for your time.

Sincerely,

Sadie Creevey

13 January 2038

Dear Miss Creevey,

Yes.

Sincerely,

Luna Scamander

13 January 2038

Adrienne,

She said yes. That is, quite literally, all she said. She did not ask any questions. She did not make any comments. Her reply was literally one word long. What do I even do with that?

Sadie

13 January 2038

Sade,

Be happy.

Adrienne

13 January 2038

Adrienne,

That was not funny.

Sadie

13 January 2038

Sade,

Yes, it was. Seriously, be happy. She said yes. So, get on with it already. You should be bouncing off the walls. I told you you could make this work. I'm just sorry that you were so in the middle of it that you couldn't see Drake. It's a pity his trip wasn't a couple of days later. We could have all had a celebration dinner. As it is, you will be stuck with me taking you to the bakery for celebratory cookies.

Adrienne

13 January 2038

Adrienne,

If this were my celebration, should we not be going for celebratory ice cream? Cookies are your weakness. Thanks for the offer, but I cannot go anywhere right now. If I am going to do this, I have got to figure out some way to make Ms. Smith okay with it.

Sadie

13 January 2038

Sade,

Good news! My stay in London has been extended. I'll actually be here for about a week. Surely we can fit an ice cream run in there somewhere. Do you have your work troubles sorted then?

Drake

14 January 2038

Dear Mrs. Scamander,

Thank you so much for your participation. Would you like to meet somewhere so that I can explain the process to you?

Sincerely,

Sadie Creevey

14 January 2038

Dear Miss Creevey,

That won't be necessary. Please call me Luna.

Luna

14 January 2038

Dear Nat,

Luna said yes, but she declined an explanation of how I am going to do the interviews. What do I do now? I can't not tell her about the memory capture charm, can I? That would not be right.

Sadie

14 January 2038

Dear Miss Creevey,

Natalie McDonald has been called out of her office to deal with a situation at our offices in the United States. She should be returning somewhere around the fifth of February. I have returned your letter so that you may decide whether to forward it to her at that location. I do apologize for any inconvenience.

Abigail Weldon

Interdepartmental Communications, W. W. Publishing

14 January 2038

Sade,

What do you think about Drake's news? Pretty cool, huh? Unwrap yourself from this project for a few minutes and come out to dinner with us.

Adrienne

14 January 2038

Dear Constance Smith,

I have secured the cooperation of Luna Scamander as an initial subject. I have one concern. She has declined knowing the details of the process for the interviews. What do I do about that, Ms. Smith?

Sincerely,

Sadie Creevey

14 January 2038

Sadie,

Declined? In writing? Dear girl, you don't do anything about that. I always told you that it was a mistake for you to do the explaining dear. You should have left it to me from the start. You don't have experience explaining things to people in the manner in which they can best understand. You offered to tell her, and she declined. The both of you are operating in complete good faith. Don't worry your pretty little head about it. You do keep copies of all of your outgoing and incoming correspondence, yes? Just like I told you to do? She is a very busy woman, and she doesn't need to be bothered with unnecessary details.

I must say I had my doubts about this secondary track that you were taking, but I think that it is going to work out just splendidly. Not that Luna herself is all that interesting – she was housemates with my mother. Flighty like you cannot begin to imagine. Loony Lovegood they used to call her. She was always wandering around with some half-baked, crazy story from her father's rag of a newspaper. Quite oblivious to the world she was. Mother and some of the others used to hide her things at school just to see if she would notice – she never did. But, she was always hanging around the others – Potter, Granger, and the Weasley girl especially. I hear she even dated Potter. She must know loads of things that have never been told. And that Granger girl. She must know all about the Hermione that the world never hears about. "Brightest witch of her age" and all that rubbish. The truth is she was a downright nasty piece of work to be around. Hexed my mother with no warning at all once – she still has a scar. She and Potter had an on-again, off-again relationship for years, even when he was dating other girls – he must have run through them like water. Heroes of the war they may be, but I think you will agree with me that it is important to not put people up on pedestals. All people have their flaws, and the public should know the bad along with the good. What a wonderful lesson that will be for your school children! All about how even deeply flawed individuals can rise to the occasion and do great things. Wouldn't that be a wonderful piece of wisdom for your books to pass on to the world? I'm looking forward to it my dear. I'm really looking forward to it.

Drop this nonsense of calling me Ms. Smith at once. It's Constance.

Anticipating the first chapter,

Constance

15 January 2038

Dear Luna,

Would it be acceptable to you to conduct our interviews by post? I do not want to take up any more of your time than absolutely necessary. I could send you a recording charmed parchment with the questions, and you can give verbal responses – you will not even need to lift a quill.

Sadie

16 January 2038

Dear Sadie,

That would be fine.

Luna

16 January 2038

Sade,

Are you still alive in that apartment? Do I need to go drag you out? Stop. Breathe. Answer your mail.

Adrienne

17 January 2038

Adrienne,

I'm really busy right now. I promise I will get back to you soon.

Sadie

17 January 2038

Dray,

I am so sorry, but I really am swamped. I just cannot get away right now.

Sadie

17 January 2038

Sade,

That's fine. I understand. I'm spending some quality time with my parents. I haven't done that for a while, so that's nice. I know how you get – don't let things stress you out too much.

Drake

17 January 2038

Sade,

I will choose to accept that you are in fact as busy as you say you are, and I will let it go for now. However, if you stop answering your mail again, I will find in necessary to forcibly enter your apartment and seize control of your daily schedule.

Adrienne

17 January 2038

Adrienne,

I will keep that in mind.

Sadie

No sooner had Sadie sent Adrienne's owl back with a reply than there was a new tapping at the window. Sadie recognized the large barn owl from the office that she had sent off with Luna's first set of questions. This was it. She took a deep breath and opened the window.


	2. Elise Lovegood

Chapter 1 – Elise Lovegood

Sadie found a treat for the office owl that had delivered the parchments from Luna and sent him on his way. This was it. If the charms had all gone correctly, this was the start of her idea becoming a tangible reality. She glanced at her clock. It was only 7:30. Luna had sent them back quickly. Taking a deep breath, she flicked her wand at the first parchment and spoke the incantation that should open it. First, the words of her question appeared at the top.

**Tell me about your life as a child. What were your parents like?**

Then, what must be Luna's voice began to fill the room.

_My mother was beautiful. Don't all little girls think that about their mother? She was brilliant as well. She could have taken her expertise and worked any number of places, but she always said she would rather be home with me. She smiled all the time. She hummed most of the day. She would sing silly songs about her Lovely Luna Moonbeam shining like the stars. We read books together and ran round the yard playing tig for hours at a time. In the afternoon, I would work on lessons while she did work on her charms. Sometimes she would let me watch. Daddy would come home from the paper in time for supper, and the three of us would spend the evening snuggled up together on the sofa. Daddy would tell us stories from work, and Mum would brush my hair until it was time for bed. They tucked me in together. We were happy._

The grown up Luna's voice faded away and the air in front of Sadie began to pulse with a rainbow of colors. The room in front of her shifted into what was obviously a young girl's bedroom. Sadie smiled to herself – her charm had worked.

"Mummy?" A very young Luna (four or five if Sadie was guessing) was settling back into the pillows of her bed while looking expectantly up at a pretty blond woman who had to be her mother – Elise was her name Sadie reminded herself.

"Yes, darling?" The woman sat herself on the bed next to Luna and began to stroke her hair back from her forehead.

"Are the stories for Daddy's paper real?" Luna's voice sounded odd – almost as if she were afraid of the answer her mother might give her.

"What do you mean?" If she hadn't heard the inflection in Elise Lovegood's voice, Sadie would have sworn the question was a stalling tactic. However, the question sounded completely sincere to Sadie – Elise seemed genuinely confused as to what had prompted her daughter's curiosity on the topic.

"Did they really happen, or did Daddy make them up like in my story books?" Luna had sat back up in the bed and was looking at her mother as if her entire universe rested on the answer she was about to be given. Which, reflected Sadie, it probably did when you were five years old.

"Why would you think they weren't true?" Elise asked her.

"Ginny says she asked her biggest brother, and he said there are no such things as snore cakes." Luna replied in a voice that managed to somehow sound authoritative and apprehensive all at once.

"Did you mean snorkacks, honey?" Elise's eyes displayed a hint of amusement.

"Yes, those." Luna nodded along with the words.

"Is that why you and Ginny were arguing before she went home yesterday?" The previous hint of amusement in her eyes had given way to a more serious expression.

"Yes." Luna responded somewhat abashedly.

"Daddy only prints the stories for the paper the exact way that the person who wrote them down said it." Luna seemed to brighten up for a moment before a frown settled across her features.

"But what if the person who gives the story to Daddy makes it up?" Her brow had begun to furrow while she thought through the possibilities.

"Everyone makes mistakes, Luna, but Daddy works very hard to try to give people a chance to tell their own stories when others won't let them." Sadie detected a hint of pride in Elise's voice this time.

"Why won't other people let them?" Now Luna sounded curious rather than concerned.

"Sometimes people don't want to believe in something until somebody else can prove to them that it is true. Sometimes they get so caught up in not believing that they even ignore things that do have proof." Elise's voice had taken on a far off quality, and she was no longer looking down at her daughter.

"Why?" Sadie chuckled to herself – Luna was definitely a born Ravenclaw. Luna's mother seemed to share Sadie's amusement, and she refocused on Luna's face.

"Sometimes learning that they were wrong scares people. Sometimes people forget that you can never prove that something isn't – you can only prove that it is." Elise seemed to notice that Luna was trying to hide a yawn behind her hands. "Just remember that you shouldn't let other people tell you what to believe. You should always decide what to believe in yourself. Are you ready for bed now?"

Luna nodded. "Is Daddy coming?" The sound of someone climbing the stairs could be heard through the open doorway as the memory came to an end.

Sadie blinked as the memory swirled out of focus and came back to show Luna hiding behind a clump of bushes in what must be her yard. Sadie couldn't see a difference in the ages of this and the previous girl so the events must have occurred close together. There was no talking this time – only giggling as Luna watched her mother search the obvious hiding places with no success.

It was odd, Sadie thought, that with everything she had ever read or heard on the subject, she never would have pegged Luna as a giggler. The giggling grew louder as Elise worked her way closer. There was no possible way that she couldn't hear it, but she was clearly drawing out the search for Luna's entertainment. Sadie watched for a few minutes as the game of hide and seek morphed into a round of tig. Mother and daughter were both giggling now, and the sound echoed across the yard as they took turns chasing each other in the bright sunlight. It was a picture perfect representation of a pleasant domestic scene.

The swirling colors returned, and she found herself staring at a large printing press as they cleared. Sadie scanned the room trying to find Luna's place in it. She noticed her, still around the same age as the previous two memories, being held up by her father so that she could peer at the finished papers as they came off the press. Luna was clearly fascinated by the process, and her father was busy explaining in painstaking detail how it all worked.

"Where does it go then, Daddy?" Luna asked twisting in his arms so that she could look him in the eye.

"After the papers come off the press, they go downstairs to the delivery room. That's where the owls are. They take the papers to the people who have ordered them or to shops so that people can pick them up there."

"What happens next?"

"We start all over again with the next edition."

"It doesn't stop?"

"No, dear, it goes in a circle. There are always more things for people to learn about." Luna seemed to ponder that comment for a moment before returning to her questioning.

"How do the owls know where to go?"

Xeno Lovegood smiled tolerantly at his daughter – he was clearly enjoying their question and answer session. "Owls are very bright creatures, Luna. They find their way."

Sadie, now familiar with the process, blinked her eyes to stop them from being assaulted by the colored swirls. When she opened them, she was staring at her own rather bare living room wall. Luna hadn't been exaggerating about her happy childhood. The three of them looked exceedingly happy together, and Luna appeared to be the center of her parents' universe.

They were patient with her childhood wonderings and appeared genuinely pleased when she questioned them on the aspects of her world that she didn't understand. It was nice to know that people had lived happy lives during the in between time. It was good to know that everything hadn't been shaded with worry for the future. Luna seemed a mostly carefree five year old. (Perhaps four, Sadie hadn't made up her mind on that point, and she had forgotten to look at the edition of the Quibbler to check the date. She would have to remember to do that when she reviewed the memories later.)

She checked the clock on her wall – 8:15. That had gone fairly quickly. Sadie took a deep breath and mumbled the charm to unlock the next parchment.

**What was it like growing up in the time between the two Voldemort risings? Did your parents talk to you about what had happened? Did you grow up expecting him to come back?**

_I think that very few parents would have wanted to tell their young children about the extent of the darkness that they had just come out from under. No, my parents did not directly speak to me about Voldemort's original rise to power. I don't remember ever hearing that name when I was very young, but it wasn't common for many people to speak his name at all. My parents were very focused on the present and living their lives as they came. _

_There were very few families who had not been touched in some way. There were relatives that were spoken of that you knew were no longer around. There were conversations between the grown ups sometimes that you didn't understand and to which you did not always pay attention. Looking back when you were older, you could piece it all together into a somewhat clearer picture of what had happened, but it was never overt. _

_As far as being concerned about his possible return, my parents lived their lives very much in the now (as I said before). A wise person once said that "Today has enough troubles without begging for tomorrow's." My mother would have said that "Today has enough joys to fill up your time." I think perhaps that people were so grateful for the respite that they wanted to take full advantage of it. _

_Perhaps that is the way it is with your friends' parents and your own. It isn't that they believe that you can't handle knowing the truth about what happened to and around them; they are just grateful that you don't have to live it yourself._

Once again Luna's voice faded away and the colors began to swirl in front of Sadie's eyes. Sadie found herself looking at what she would guess from the shape of the room (the Lovegoods had a most interestingly constructed home) to be their sitting room. Luna's mother was reading one of the numerous books that were scattered across the end table, and rain could be heard being battered against the window by the wind. Luna came skipping into the room and scooted herself up against her mother's side on the sofa.

"Did you find what you were looking for in the closet, luv?" Luna solemnly shook her head in the negative. "Did you want me to help you?" Luna shook her head negatively again.

"I found something else." Luna replied while peering at the book still held in her mother's hands.

"Was it something interesting enough to chase away the rainy day doldrums?" Elise's voice carried a teasing quality in the tone, and Sadie would have bet that there had been a previous discussion about things to do on a rainy day.

Luna nodded her head affirmatively this time. "Umhmm, I found a box of pictures and things, Mummy. Some of them were of you, but I don't know who all the other people are."

Sadie used the pause in the conversation to look around for a clue as to Luna's age. She looked older than the last set of memories – maybe seven. Luna's mother had stopped reading, and her focus was entirely on her daughter. Catching the expression on her face, Sadie stopped looking for the date and tried to figure out the meaning of Elise's expression. It was almost wary, as if she was concerned about what Luna had found.

"Were they nice pictures?" Sadie could tell that Elise's voice was beginning to display a strained quality. Luna seemed to pick up on it as well and shifted so she was looking at her mother's face.

She nodded her head again but then asked "How come none of the pictures had Daddy in them?"

The tension in Elise's shoulders seemed to loosen slightly as Luna took the conversation in this direction. "I didn't always know Daddy. I met him after I was grown up. Are these pictures of me as a little girl?"

"No, you were grown up. Ginny's mum and dad are in them too, I think." Luna giggled. "Mr. Arthur looks different with more hair. I put one in my pocket. Do you want to see?"

Elise had stiffened again, but she nodded her head. Luna pulled the picture from her pocket and held it up for her mother's inspection. Sadie began to move to a position behind the sofa so that she could see the picture as well.

"You look happy. Are you dancing with that man who isn't Daddy? Is that Mrs. Molly and Mr. Arthur? I don't know who those people in the middle are." Luna chattered away focused more on the people in the picture than on her mother.

"Yes, those are Ginny's mum and dad." Elise's voice had gotten very quiet, but Luna seemed to detect something wrong in the inflection of the words.

"Was I not supposed to open that box, Mummy? I'm sorry. I'll put the picture back." She was looking up at her mother clearly concerned that she had done something wrong.

Elise gave Luna a smile that didn't quite reach her eyes. "It's quite all right, dearest. Mummy was just surprised because she hasn't looked in that box for a very long time."

Ever the curious Ravenclaw to be, Luna immediately had questions. "How long?"

"Before you were born. Before I even got married to Daddy."

"Why?" Elise gave her daughter a real smile this time – displaying again that appreciation for Luna's curiosity that both her parents seemed to have. She avoided answering this question, however, and changed the topic.

"You are right, Luna Moonbeam, Ginny's daddy does look different." Luna snuggled up against her mother and studied the picture. Sadie did as well. It showed three couples standing under a banner that read "Congratulations!" It was a party of some type – probably an engagement party by the look of things. The much younger Molly (who was very pregnant) and Arthur Weasley stood on the right side of the photo. A younger version of Luna's mother stood with a young man on the left side. Every view moments the young man would twirl Elise around, and she would lean her head back and laugh. In the middle, stood a young man (who absolutely had to be a sibling of the man with Elise) with his arm around a brown-haired girl whom Sadie didn't recognize. The unknown girl would look up at the man with his arm around her and smile at him then glance back down at the ring that was adorning her left hand. Sadie had been correct about the engagement party. Her thoughts were interrupted by Luna's voice again questioning her mother.

"That can't be Ginny in her mum's tummy." Luna stated in a matter of fact voice.

"How did you work that out?" Her mother asked her with another one of those appreciative smiles.

"Because, Mummy," Luna said as if it were the most obvious thing in the world, "Ginny and I are the same age. If this picture if before you met Daddy, it can't be Ginny because I would be in your tummy too."

"That was very good logic, darling. I'm proud of you for figuring that out. You're right. I believe that is Ronald in Mrs. Molly's tummy." Elise turned from regarding her daughter back to looking at the picture still clutched in Luna's hands.

"You look happy. Did you like dancing with that man? Who is he?" The questions poured out of Luna in a well-practiced manner. Her mother turned back to look at her again.

"He was somebody I knew a long time ago." Elise seemed to shake off the quiet, far off quality in her voice before she continued. "You know I've been friends with Ginny's mum for a long time?" She questioned.

"Umhmm," Luna said, "that's why Mrs. Molly comes for tea and brings Ginny with her. You're friends with Mrs. Molly, and I'm friends with Ginny."

"That's right, dear." Elise took a deep breath and continued. "That man standing next to me was Mrs. Molly's brother. The six of us in that picture all used to be friends."

"How come they don't come for tea? Don't all friends come for tea?" Sadie wondered if Luna's parents had ever regretted their decision to be so encouraging of her question asking propensities. Granted, it was working out really well for Sadie, but still.

"Sometimes friends do, and sometimes friends do other things together. But, sometimes, friends can't come to visit you any more." Elise's voice was returning to that far off quality that Sadie had noted before.

"Why not?" Luna continued.

"Sometimes people have to go away, Luna." Elise was definitely thinking about something. Her eyes were getting a bit of a glazed look about them.

"And they can't come back to visit?" Luna was not missing any opportunities on the question asking. Sadie found herself thinking that it must have been rather exhausting to live in that perpetual state of answering, but her parents didn't seem to mind at all. Whatever worked for them, she supposed.

"That depends on where they have gone. These friends have gone away to a place from which they can't come back to visit." Luna seemed to be piecing some things together. Her expression eventually turned to one that indicated that she was pleased to have figured something out.

"Like Grammy?" She inquired.

"Yes, just like Grammy. They've been gone for a long time." Elise shook off the glazed expression and looked back at her daughter.

"Were you sad when they went away? Like you were when Grammy did?" Luna was looking concerned now.

"Yes, I was." Elise pulled the picture from Luna's hand and set it on the low table in front of them. She scooped Luna up in her arms and settled her onto her lap.

"Daddy made you feel better when Grammy went away. Who made you feel better if you didn't know Daddy?" Luna craned her neck back to peer up into her mother's face.

Elise smiled down at her daughter. "Sometimes my little Moonbeam you notice so many things that I don't know what I'm going to do with you." Elise sighed and then smiled. "I met your Daddy when I was still sad, and he made me feel better then. He always does."

"Was Mrs. Molly sad?" Luna was sounding concerned again.

"She was. She missed her brothers very much." Elise pointed at the two blond men in the picture.

"Is she sad now?" Luna's brow was furrowing again.

"I think she still misses them sometimes. Just like I miss Grammy sometimes." Elise was hugging Luna close.

"Can we make her feel better? I like Mrs. Molly, and I don't want Ginny's mum to be sad." Luna nestled her head under her mother's chin.

"Maybe." Elise seemed to be pondering something, and Luna noticed the change in her voice when she spoke.

"Are you sad now, Mummy?" Luna twisted round until she remained on her mother's lap but was facing her.

"No, honey. I'm not sad anymore." Elise stated holding eye contact with her.

"But you don't look happy." Luna responded placing a hand on either side of her mother's face.

"I'm not sad, dearest. I'm just thinking that there is something that I should have done a long time ago to help Mrs. Molly feel better. I'll fix it now. Tell me, Luna, was there a gold watch in the box with the pictures?"

"Umhmm." Luna replied while still studying her mother's face.

"Would you run and fetch it for me?" Elise's whole face had brightened. You could tell that she had resolved something within herself and was happy with the decision she had made.

Luna slid herself off Elise's lap and hurried to the door to follow her mother's instructions, but she stopped short at the threshold. She paused a moment before spinning around and running to embrace her mother.

"I'm happy you don't have to be sad any more," came the muffled voice from the head buried in Elise's shoulder.

"Me too, darling, me too."

Sadie found herself wiping tears from her eyes as she blinked to avoid the onslaught of colored lights. The scene had made her feel an uncomfortable tickling in her throat – it was like those dratted commercials for greeting cards that she always got silly over on her muggle grandparents' telly. In addition, there was a whole lot of information in what Elise hadn't said and a whole lot of questions left unanswered.

It suddenly occurred to her that no one had ever really tried to tell the personal tales of the first war with Voldemort either. (Well, except for Harry Potter's which had been told and retold and speculated on so many times that no one could be quite sure what exactly had happened.) The children in Luna's generation had been just like her and Adrienne and Drake – growing up happy but still knowing that there were things that the adults around them weren't telling.

She wondered if it was always like that. She had always thought that this disconnect from their parents that her friends had felt was because of the specific situation that their parents had gone through. What if it wasn't? What if every generation had huge chunks of their lives that they never bothered to tell their children about? What if every generation of children grew up never really knowing who their parents were as people? That was just depressing. Maybe she should go ahead and stop for tonight – let herself take in everything she had seen. With a start, she realized that she had paused the memories without even thinking about it. She could thank her muggle grandparents and their movie collection for that idea. Stopping for the night was probably not a good idea. She was in the middle of a question after all. She should at least finish it out.

The new scene once again opened in the sitting room of the Lovegood's home. Elise was wearing a traveling cloak and helping Luna (similarly attired) put on mittens.

"Why are you going to St. Mungo's? Are you sick?" The constant questions really did have to be absolutely exhausting Sadie caught herself thinking.

"I'm not sick, Luna Moonbeam." Luna looked very similar to the previous memory. Her hair was even braided in the same manner. Thus, Sadie speculated it hadn't occurred too far in time from the previous conversation.

"Is Daddy sick?" Maybe children should not be part of her future Sadie speculated.

"No one is sick." The mittens were on, and the two were headed toward the front door.

"Then why are you going?" Cats were relatively quiet creatures.

"Mummy's going to visit some friends there." The front yard was covered in a light dusting of snow.

"Are they sick?" Dogs were louder, but they were also more likely to fetch things for you. That might be even better.

"In a way." They were walking toward what Sadie assumed was Ottery St. Catchpole.

"May I come too?" Owls – now owls were very useful, but they could also be loud and were rather messy.

"I thought you were looking forward to spending the day with Ginny today?" Besides, there were plenty of owls at work to borrow when she needed one.

"I like to play with Ginny, but I like to go places with you better." Elise and Luna were holding hands as they walked down the lane, and Luna had begun to swing their arms back and forth.

"I know you do, honey. We'll go visit Diagon Alley together next week." Luna appeared to be getting excited; she had begun to skip instead of walk.

"Really?" So, there really was no need to be responsible for an owl of her own.

"Yes, where would you like to go?" Hmm . . . cat or dog? Greater usefulness or greater quiet?

"Can we look at the animals?" She would definitely have to think that one over.

Elise laughed. "We can look, but no buying. That last cat nearly ate Daddy's owl." Ouch. Maybe a cat wasn't such a good idea. She really didn't want to have to explain to one of her bosses that she had let one of the office owls end up a snack for her pet.

"I hope your friends feel better soon." Sadie shook off her meandering thoughts on the potential perks of pets over children. She must be getting tired.

The new memory took place in a yard that Sadie didn't recognize. A tall house that looked ready to topple over at any moment filled the background. Sadie spotted a young girl with red hair playing next to Luna in the yard. She decided that the girl must be Ginny Weasley, and the house must be The Burrow.

"Could we go play in the woods?" Luna was asking her friend.

"Mum doesn't like us to go where she can't see. Not unless Bill or Charlie take us. It's silly. I don't need the boys to take care of me." Ginny sounded exasperated.

"But even if she can't see you, she could just look at her clock." Luna replied with a tone of voice usually reserved for someone stating the very obvious.

"I don't think Mum likes that clock very much."

"I like your clock. It's different. We don't have one like it at my house. Why doesn't she like it?" Luna was back to questions.

"I don't know. She just looks at it funny sometimes. Like when Dad is late at work. She sits and stares at it. I don't like it when she gets like that." Ginny's voice had gotten quieter as she spoke. The last sentence was a whisper, almost as if she was afraid of admitting it out loud.

"Maybe your dad should floo her when he's late."

"That's what Mum always says. Do you know what he says back?"

"What?"

"Can you keep a secret?"

"Yes."

"My brothers don't even know, but I do because I listen better than them. When Dad thinks nobody can hear him, he calls Mum 'Mollywobbles.' Isn't that funny? It's like he's talking to a baby. He always calls her that when he's late. 'Mollywobbles,' he says, 'don't look at me like that. You know it's not the same. I'm perfectly safe and so are the children.'"

"Then why does she still worry?"

"I don't know. She's just like that."

Sadie found herself staring at the bleak wall again digesting everything she had just seen. She should really do something about that wall. Didn't she have some pictures somewhere that she could put up? Shaking her head to bring her brain back to the topic at hand she pondered what she should tell Constance. Until Nat got back from the States, keeping Constance happy was going to be the only way to keep the project going. Constance didn't want a textbook. Sadie had no illusions about that. Maybe a general print biography wouldn't be so bad after all. It could still get picked up for secondary readings in the coursework at Hogwarts, and it could also reach people who had already left school – people her age who would resonate with the feeling of growing up with those unspoken pieces of people's lives in the background. That wouldn't be bad at all. With that happy thought, she broke the lock on the third parchment.

**As I understand it, there were still some disappearances and deaths tied to Voldemort's followers during those years. Did you lose anyone?**

_No members of my immediate family were victims of direct attacks by the remnants of the Death Eaters during that time._

They were back in the Lovegood sitting room. Luna and Ginny were stationed in front of the window (through which rain could be seen pouring down) playing a game of Exploding Snap. Elise and Molly were seated on the sofa sipping tea. Elise looked upset and not altogether well. There were dark circles under her eyes, and Sadie would have sworn that she was thinner than she had been.

"I saw him the other day. Molly, he was trailing after his grandmother in Diagon Alley, and he looked so lost. He doesn't look like a happy child. He looks like he's carrying the weight of the whole world on his shoulders. He's practically afraid of his own shadow. She wasn't even paying him enough mind to know whether he was keeping up with her or not. I know she's grieving, but she can't take it out on him. It just isn't right."

Molly leaned forward and gave Elise's hand a pat. "I don't think it's right either. Complaining right in front of him that he's practically a squib. It's not as though any of the old biddies she calls round to are going to correct her – my Auntie Muriel included. She's his family, and we'll just have to hope she comes round in time. That's no way to treat a child, but there isn't really anything we can do about it."

"If his parents got better . . ."

"You aren't still on that, are you? Elise, you are. That's not your responsibility."

"I'm getting closer. Molly, I can feel it. Every day something else clicks into place. I'm almost there. I've almost got it. I'm so close."

"Is that why you're looking like something the cat drug in? When was the last time you slept?"

"I'll sleep when I've got it figured out."

"You're getting obsessed. What about Luna?"

"What about Luna? We do the same things that we've always done together. I have to do this."

"No, you don't. That's what the healers are for – they're the ones working on it."

"They aren't even trying any more. I've been there. They're in the unreversible ward. They've given up on them. Everyone has. I can't. There have been so many things that I couldn't do anything about. Molly, there have been so many things that went wrong that I couldn't fix. This, this is different. I could really help this time. Please understand. I need to do this." Elise's eyes were fixed on Molly Weasley's face in a pleading manner. Molly stared back for a long moment before she ducked her head breaking the eye contact.

"Fine, but don't let it take over your life. Don't you think I didn't notice that you didn't eat anything with your tea. You're wound so tightly you look like you could fall apart at any moment. Starving yourself and not sleeping isn't going to help. You aren't going to figure anything out any faster by making yourself so tired that you can't even think straight. Does Xeno know that you're acting like this?"

"He knows what I'm like when I'm close to the end of a project. He's used to this."

Molly was shaking her head in disagreement. "This is different. Elise, I've known you for a long time. This is not your usual I'm onto something, and I'm going to chase it down frantic mode. This is way past that."

Elise paused as if she were searching for the proper words to use in her reply. She reached over and touched Molly's arm – succeeding in getting Molly to look back up at her. "Molly, do you remember how we always said that it was no use dwelling because we couldn't bring them back?"

Molly Weasley tensed and tears appeared at the corners of her eyes. The look on Elise's face had almost become desperate. Molly's voice was so soft that Sadie could barely make out the sound of the gentle "I do."

"This time I can."

The new memory focused on Luna and her mother sitting at a table. They were obviously looking over something in Luna's book that confused her. Suddenly, an expression of sheer delight defused itself over Elise's features and she let out a gasped "Of course." She jumped from her chair and headed toward the hall muttering phrases like "that's got to be it" and "why didn't I think of that before."

What had been a faintly confused look on Luna's face quickly turned full blown as she got up to follow. "Mummy? What's going on?" As she started down the stairs after her mother, a bright flash of light made Sadie close her eyes in response. Realizing what was happening, she quickly stopped the memory from playing.

Before she even stopped to think about what she was doing, she said the words to erase that memory from the pensieve charm. No one should be allowed to watch Luna see her mother die. It wasn't right. No matter what Constance said about tragedy selling, some things were sacred and private.

The third memory was still unwatched, and Sadie sat for some time trying to decide whether or not she should play it. It wasn't until she noticed the sun coming in through the window behind her that she moved from her chair. How many hours had she been sitting there? It was better to go ahead and watch it she decided. If it needed to be erased, it was better to handle it sooner over later.

Luna (looking more disheveled than Sadie had yet seen her) sat on some stairs picking at the feeble attempt at a hair braid that lay across her shoulder. Raised voices that Sadie identified as Xeno Lovegood and Molly Weasley could be heard coming from a closed door in the hallway.

"Let Ginny come see her, or let me take her home to see Ginny. She needs her friends right now. So do you. You can't keep shutting people out. You aren't alone right now, and you both need to realize that."

Xeno Lovegood's voice was a far cry from the tone of amusement that Sadie had previously heard him using with Luna. It sounded almost strangled. "Molly, I know you are trying to help. I appreciate that; I really do, but Luna and I need some time to ourselves right now. We need time to figure out how our lives work without her in it. We need time to figure out how our family works with just the two of us. We just need time. One of my contributors has offered to take us on an expedition with him, and we are going to go. I need you to respect that. I need for you to leave us alone for a while."

Sadie forgot to blink and the residual colored lights danced across her bare wall for a few moments. She felt tired and drained which made no sense because she had spent almost the last twelve hours doing absolutely nothing but sitting in a chair. She would have to think this all through, process it into story notes, and get a draft to Constance, but right now that was the last thing she wanted to be doing. Walking into her bedroom she unthinkingly grabbed the teddy bear her muggle grandfather had given her for her third birthday off his place on her dresser and hugged him close as she curled up in her comforter. She suddenly felt very young, very unsure, and very worried about what she had gotten herself into with this story.

Her muggle grandmother was always saying that things looked brighter in the morning; Sadie would amend that to say that things always look brighter after you have slept. It was nearly four o'clock in the afternoon, and she was feeling decidedly better. It wouldn't do at all to get so emotionally attached to the subjects she was writing about. She had known, of course, that Luna's mother had died when she was very young. She just hadn't been expecting Luna to tie that particular question to that memory. That could prove to be an interesting addition – Luna's mother had apparently been working on something to help someone who had been seriously injured during the first rise to power. She wondered if she could figure out who. It must have been two someones she realized. The words used had all been plural. There was also the matter of that picture. Maybe she could get Adrienne to do some research for her. If the door was opening up, she was not going to be opposed to broadening the project into the realm of the initial Voldemort rising. Right now, however, she had writing to do.

20 January 2038

Adrienne,

I need a sounding board. Would you mind? I am sending you the transcripts of what I have gotten from Luna with my rough draft story notes attached. I have been staring at them for so long that I cannot even begin to form an opinion anymore. Normally I would owl it to Nat, but she will not be back for another couple of weeks. I do not want to show them to Constance. She will only complain that they are not nearly "novelly" enough.

They have got me wondering some things. Do you think all the kids early lives were like that? Do you think they all noticed little things that did not make sense until later?

I also need your help in your professional capacity. Do you think you could do some research for me? I would like to know some more about Luna's mother. Maybe who those other people in the picture were. I would also really like to know what exactly it was she was working on when that charm backfired. I don't suppose there would be any way to find out whom she was trying to help and what she was trying to help them recover from, would there?

Thanks,

Sadie

21 January 2038

Sade,

The story was brilliant. (No, I'm not bluffing in my best friend capacity.) I would have done a lot less sleeping in History of Magic if I had actually felt like I was reading about real people. It was great. You really did it. You took what would have been a textbook sentence that read something like "The magical community of the British Isles existed in a state of relative stasis during the years of 1981 to 1995." and turned it into something that actually means something. Well done!

I'm the wrong one to ask about the lives of magical children in those years. Did you forget that my dad's muggle born just like yours? Then, there's that little thing about how none of them will ever talk to us about any of the things that happened. If I recall correctly, that's what got this whole endeavor started. I didn't even know my dad had been involved until I got to Hogwarts. Moreover, my mum's American. She wouldn't be able to tell us anything anyway. Your mum's pureblood. Do you think she might talk to you about it?

Research is something with which I can help. It is my job to answer requests for information from the Ministry Archives after all. I'll just move yours to the top of the pile. I'll see what I can find about Molly Weasley's brothers. I can probably find out who the engaged girl was as well. They used to make a big deal out of putting engagement announcements in the _Prophet_. The other part might not be so easy. St. Mungo's records are not public information, but I'll see what I can do.

Adrienne

21 January 2038

Adrienne,

Moving my requests to the top of the pile isn't going to get you in trouble, is it? Thanks for the feedback – I just hope the executive board feels the same way.

Sadie

21 January 2038

Sade,

Oh please. Like anyone pays attention to what I do down here. I am left on my own for days on end surrounded by piles and piles of dusty books that no one may touch without my express permission. I have the greatest job ever. My supervisor has got to be 150 years old, and he doesn't care what I do all day as long as I remember that beverages are not allowed in the archive rooms. I even charmed my desk plate to read "Adrienne Finch-Fletchley – To receive assistance please place cookies here." One of the healer trainees that was down here working on a paper the other day actually made a trip to the cafeteria to bring me some sugar oatmeal cookies. Of course, being from the cafeteria, they were stale, but a cookie is still a cookie. Anyway . . . the point is that I can pretty much research whatever I want whenever I want to because it's not like anyone else is crazy enough to want this job. Don't sweat it.

Adrienne

22 January 2038

Sadie,

I'm being quite patient with you. Where's my first chapter, dear? If you are having some trouble, I would be most happy to look through your source material and point out which items would be best for publication. This is very large for your first project, and I don't want you getting overwhelmed. Just remember that I'm here to help. That's why editors are here. I expect either the request for help or your rough draft on my desk first thing in the morning.

Constance

23 January 2038

Constance,

Again, I do appreciate your attention to my work. It was really very sweet of you to offer to help, however, rest assured that I am not in over my head. The project is progressing quite nicely. I think it falls more into her realm of informational books, so Natalie will be reviewing my rough draft. I know you are very busy, and I didn't want to unnecessarily take up your time.

Sadie

24 January 2038

Dear Miss Creevey,

It has come to my attention that there is a potential problem with your current project. We were all very excited at the unique perspective that you were bringing to this subject, my dear. We are, likewise, eager to see that it lives up to its full potential. You will join me in my office for a meeting at 2:00 p.m. this afternoon. At that time, you may explain to me why my office was invaded by a rather loudly complaining Constance Smith this morning.

Expectantly,

Winston Hopkirk

President, W. W. Publishing

24 January 2038

Adrienne,

It really was not so bad. He was a lot more understanding than I expected. He also liked my rough draft. I even explained the part about how muggle textbooks have those little biographical asides, and he was intrigued. He is going to look into it.

I have to produce my current drafts for Constance's inspection any time she demands, but I do not have to turn over my source material. That is the decree from on high, so she cannot do anything about it (other than complaining, which I am sure will occur in abundance). It is my own fault for writing my letter to her that way anyway. You know what I get like when I have not been sleeping properly.

Anyway . . . He wants me to broaden out. I am supposed to track down the original DA members and use them for source material. The problem is that the members of the DA are not written down anywhere. The books all say "the DA." Maybe Luna could make me a list? Do not fret if I am not overly wordy in my letters for the next few days, okay? I have to have a set of standard questions for the DA members (when I track them down), a revised draft of Luna's childhood, and rough drafts of two new sections by the first. Did I mention that Mr. Hopkirk is nice but demanding?

Sadie

24 January 2038

Sadie,

How are things at work? I would really like to talk to you in person. Any way we can make that happen this week?

Drake

24 January 2038

Dray,

I am absolutely swamped. Sorry.

Sadie

24 January 2038

Dear Luna,

Thank you so much for your prompt reply to my original questions. My publisher is very excited about this project and wishes to proceed rather quickly. He would also like me to broaden my interview base. Would it be at all possible for you to provide me with a list of the original DA members?

Thank you so much,

Sadie

25 January 2038

Sadie,

The first draft was nicely written, dear. I said you have a knack for this. But, it does come across as rather simple. You take things far too easily at face value. There is always a bigger story hidden underneath. There are several things that you need to elaborate upon. Here are just a few suggestions for you to look into.

1. What was Luna's father doing to her during those two years of traveling and expeditions that turned her from a relatively normal child into the downright batty individual that showed up at Hogwarts?

2. What exactly was Elise Lovegood doing in that basement lab? Illicit, unapproved charms? Recklessly putting her ambition above her own and her family's safety?

3. Elise was clearly involved with one of the Prewett boys and not too long before she married Xenophilius Lovegood either. Those Weasley children were practically stacked on top of each other. There can't be that large of a gap between Ronald and Ginevra. Was Luna actually an illegitimate Prewett child? Is that why Molly Weasley seemed so determined to meddle after Elise died?

That should be enough to get you started. Do a little digging. It should be easy enough. Or, if you prefer to concentrate on your writing, you could give me the directions for your special little charm and I could conduct the interviews for you. That might be better all around, dear. It would let you focus on using your writing talents. Let me know.

Also, Mr. Hopkirk has informed me that you are supposed to do some checking into the members of the DA. You may as well begin with my parents. They would be most happy to help. I find it only fair to warn you, however, that you will be sorely disappointed in what you find out. It has been built into the stuff of legends, you know. I'm sure you grew up with the stories. How they were this wonderful group of student defenders of Hogwarts and all that tosh. It isn't true at all. During the Harry Potter years, they were just a way for him to delude himself into thinking he was doing something grand. My parents were all excited at the prospect of fighting illegal Ministry influence in Hogwarts, and they signed right up.

They quickly discovered that it was all just Harry Potter shouting out orders, making them practice charms a second year would have already learned over and over, while he tried to brainwash them into thinking that he was leading them into some kind of battle against evil. His battle with Voldemort may have turned out all right in the end, but he was always a little too full of himself on the way to getting there.

You couldn't question the "Chosen One" either. My father tried. There was always a gaggle of Weasley children there to threaten you if you didn't follow orders. Grasping – that's what that family was. They knew which way the wind was blowing, and they got their hooks into Potter as soon as they could. There's a reason that Weasley boy dug into Potter and spent the next six years as his shadow. It was the same with the girl. They must have been plotting for that match for years. The Weasley name needed all the help it could get, and we all know how desperately they needed the Potter family money. Pathetic, if you ask me.

Mother tried to get out as well, and that's when the Granger girl came after her. They would be happy to tell you all about it. You certainly aren't going to get the straight story from any of the rest of them. Potter had them all brainwashed. It almost got them all killed too. He had them so caught up in thinking that they were some kind of fighting force that scads of them stayed to fight in the Battle of Hogwarts. Untrained children going up against grown Death Eaters. It was suicidal madness, that's what. I don't know how Potter sleeps at night with it on his conscience.

They'll tell you that they were "resisting" during that year that Snape was Headmaster at Hogwarts as well. What nonsense. Mother had already graduated, but father knows all about it. They were just running round mouthing off to the faculty and painting slogans on walls. Resisting, my foot. It was an excuse to run wild and act like delinquents. I'll let Mother and Father know to expect your owl then?

Constance

25 January 2038

Sadie,

Enclosed you will find a complete list of the members of the DA. I must say that I'm rather surprised that you didn't just ask your father.

Luna

25 January 2038

Adrienne,

Here is the DA list I got from Luna. I have not even had time to look at it. Would you be a dear and find locations for me?

Sadie

25 January 2038

Luna,

Thank you again. I do appreciate your help. My father is always rather reluctant to talk about my uncle, and I did not want to bring up a distressing subject for him. I will be sending along my next set of questions shortly.

Sadie

25 January 2038

Sade,

You really need to look at the DA list that Luna sent you.

Adrienne

25 January 2038

Adrienne,

I do not have time. I will get to it later. I am busy.

Sadie

25 January 2038

Sadie,

I'm serious. You need to look at the list.

Adrienne

25 January 2038

Adrienne,

I appreciate your help, but stop owling me. I am neck deep in stuff here. I will look at it later.

Sadie

25 January 2038

Constance,

I appreciate the offer from your parents, and I will probably interview them in the near future. At the moment, however, I need to focus on the next few chapters that Mr. Hopkirk is expecting.

Sadie

25 January 2038

Sadie,

Isn't there any way you can take a half-hour or so off and meet me somewhere? Or I could come over?

Drake

25 January 2038

Drake,

What is with you? You are practically being whiny. I am sorry, but I am quite busy. This is important. I am sorry I am missing your visit, but I will see you when things are less hectic. I have got to get back to work, and all the owls are really distracting.

Sadie

25 January 2038

Sadie,

Of course, you need to work on one thing at a time. I completely understand. My parents will be most happy to speak with you whenever it is convenient. Get some work done on those questions I suggested for you. That is, after all, what editors are for – to help you gain a larger vision for the scope of your writing. My offer still stands – I would be pleased as punch to help you out with your interviewing. We don't want you to be getting overworked and burnt out. That wouldn't do at all.

Constance

When the large barn owl tapped at Sadie's window, she was ready to explode with frustration. But this one wasn't another unnecessary interruption in her frantic question drafting. This one was from Luna. Sadie smiled, sank into her comfortable reclining chair, and broke the seal on the first parchment.


	3. Hogwarts, The Early Years

Chapter 2 – Hogwarts, The Early Years

**It is now understood that some members of the teaching staff at Hogwarts were involved in the Order of the Phoenix or other groups dedicated to opposing Voldemort's second rise to power. Did you notice any of the faculty members actively working for this cause during your early years at the school? Were any of them subtlety or overtly engaged in swaying students in this direction?**

_My favorite class was Muggle Studies with Professor Charity Burbage. That's not what you expected to hear, was it? You thought it would be something more exciting. Care of Magical Creatures perhaps? I knew more about the care of all types of magical creatures (not just the ministry approved for study ones) before I ever came to Hogwarts than most students with a NEWT in the subject would ever dream of knowing. I lived and breathed nothing but magical creatures from my ninth to eleventh years. Muggle Studies was an entirely different world to explore. _

_I was sorted Ravenclaw for a reason. I enjoy knowledge for knowledge's sake. Professor Burbage knew her subject well. You walked out of her classroom each session knowing that you had just been in the presence of someone who believed her subject was important and special and infinitely worth studying. She was a woman with a cause. She was preparing us (she thought) to grow up and go out into the world knowing that the Muggle world and our world were fundamentally the same – they were both comprised of people, and people were people whether they had magic or not. She was training us to stand against those who refused to accept that our similarities were greater than our differences. I can see that in retrospect. She was fighting the darkness via the path that was available to her at the time, and she did it well. She did it so well that it cost her her life. The Malfoy boy told the ministry when they were putting together the names for the memorial. Not all heroes die in battle. Some of them have their light snuffed out quietly somewhere outside of the spotlight. _

25 January 2038

Adrienne,

Could you also get me the details of the death of the Muggle Studies teacher? It is Burbage, Charity.

Sadie

It was a classroom this time. Given Luna's response to her question, Sadie guessed that the woman concluding her lecture at the front of the room must be Professor Burbage (making the class Muggle Studies). What appeared to be light bulbs were scattered across the tables in the room with some of them having been dismantled. Luna was seated toward the front of the class with a group of Ravenclaws who all had their chairs scooted slightly farther from Luna's than it was necessary for them to be.

"Miss Lovegood," Professor Burbage said as the students began to gather up their belongings to go. "Would you be so kind as to stay after class and help me put these away?" She gestured toward the bulbs scattered around the room.

Luna merely nodded and retrieved a box from the front of the room in which to place them. As Luna and Professor Burbage cleared the tables, Sadie noticed that the teacher seemed to be studying Luna as they worked. She finally decided to speak. "I thought we might talk about some things that I've noticed lately in my classroom. Do you mind?"

Luna, collecting the last of the bulbs from the back table, turned round with a curious look. "Is there a problem, Professor Burbage?"

"I was hoping that you could tell me that. Was I mistaken this afternoon or did one of your seatmates attempt to vanish your textbook in the middle of my lecture?" Professor Burbage's voice was kind but a little strained.

"I'm sorry if it disturbed you, Professor." Luna replied quite calmly.

"I was actually thinking that _you_ might have found it disturbing." The teacher's tone of voice was very gentle, almost as if she were trying to convince some skittish wild creature to come closer.

Luna shrugged while answering, "Not particularly."

"And if she had been successful in her undertaking, would you have been disturbed then?" A faint note of frustration was creeping into the woman's voice now.

Luna smiled at her teacher. "You give rather detailed notes. I daresay the inconvenience would have been minimal."

"I see." Professor Burbage seemed to ponder the situation for a moment. "I am tempted to report this behavior to Professor Flitwick. I suppose it would accomplish very little, however, and might even have unpleasant consequences for yourself." The woman shook her head and sighed before taking the conversation in a different direction.

"You show quite an aptitude for this subject. Many students from the old families have difficulty learning to look at life from a different perspective. You don't seem to have that problem. You seem to be more open than most."

"Thank you." Sadie decided it must be Luna's first year of Muggle Studies – that would make her a third year. Obviously, the "moving" of Luna's stuff that Constance had mentioned had already been going on for some time. Luna didn't seem to think it out of the ordinary. She was very nonchalant about the whole situation. Had the others picked on her from the very beginning of her school career? Had they ever given her a chance? Or had they taken in her slightly bedraggled appearance and her faith in her father's paper and written her off as not worth getting to know?

"There's a muggle saying that I would like to share with you. It's called 'thinking outside the box.' It means that instead of sticking with the way things have always been done, a person really looks at the world around them and tries to find a way to do things differently. That type of person knows that there is always more than one way to solve a problem, and they look for it when everyone else has become discouraged and given up. That kind of thinking makes many people uncomfortable. They don't understand why someone can't just stick with the tried and true way of looking at things, but when something goes wrong, it's the thinking outside the box that usually saves the day. You remind me of that phrase. I appreciate that in a student."

Luna's eyes were focused intently on Professor Burbage's face, and Sadie could practically see the wheels spinning in her head as she mulled over the words that had just been spoken.

Professor Burbage continued "Luna, pencil in Tuesdays at four on your calendar."

Luna's brow furrowed, "I'm sorry?"

The young woman smiled at her, "It's another muggle expression. You have a standing invitation to tea in my office each Tuesday afternoon at four. You may show up or not – that's entirely up to you, but I'll be there ready to listen or discuss as the case may be. Coursework, world events, Quidditch statistics – whatever you would like."

Luna's furrowed brow was easing into a brilliant smile as the memory shifted, and Sadie found herself smiling as well. No wonder Professor Burbage had been Luna's favorite teacher. It wasn't exactly a thought that Sadie would have expected to be connected to her original question, but Luna had developed a habit of surprising her. Why would she associate a kind teacher taking the trouble to get to know her with the fight against Voldemort? Had the teas been secret recruiting sessions? Did Charity Burbage make a habit of cosying up to disaffected students and using their isolation to push them into joining a cause? Sadie shook her head. Where had that question come from? It was worthy of Constance herself. The thought made Sadie feel faintly queasy for some reason. She was being ridiculous. There was not some massive headline making conspiracy hiding under every aspect of Luna's memories. Charity Burbage was just a kind woman who cared about her students. There was nothing sinister about that. She was obviously more tolerant of Luna's differences than Luna's classmates had been. That was probably the association Luna had made in her head. Tolerance was not something that would have been appreciated under Voldemort.

Sadie realized that the next memory had started while she was pondering, but she didn't appear to have missed anything important. The scene was still taking place in the Muggle Studies' classroom, but Luna looked older. Most of the students had a harried, almost exhausted look about them. Sadie recognized that look. It must be close to time for O.W.L.S. She did a quick scan for Luna and discovered her sitting near the back at a table. She was not sitting with other Ravenclaws as tradition would dictate but with a girl wearing Gryffindor colors – Ginny Weasley. The two of them seemed to be decidedly more relaxed than the other students. One Ravenclaw in the front row was frantically waving her hand in the air. Her voice, when Professor Burbage called on her, was nothing short of panicked.

"Do you mean to say that we won't be revising at all?"

Professor Burbage smiled indulgently, "That's exactly what I am saying. All this last minute cramming isn't good for any of you. I can't stop you when you walk out that door, but it isn't going to happen on my time. You've all done very well with the coursework this term, and I have every confidence that you will all pass your O.W.L.S. with little to no trouble – provided, of course, that you all manage to relax and remember to breathe. I have something more important to discuss with you today."

She paused for a moment to allow the echo from the collective gasp to die away. "I'm choosing to say this to you now because I know that some of you won't be returning to my classroom for N.E.W.T. level work – despite your impressive passing scores on your coming examination." She added looking directly at the girl from earlier who seemed ready to hyperventilate at any moment. "Someday you will be old and gray, and in the grand scheme of things it isn't really going to matter if you remember that you once knew that the word is pronounced 'electricity' or that one does not need to shout to be heard when speaking into a telephone." Sadie noticed that Ginny Weasley seemed to be very amused by that last bit.

Professor Burbage was scanning the room again – pausing to make eye contact with each one of her students. "It is all useful information, but it isn't what I hope you retain from your time here. There is one and only one principle that I care that you take with you when you go. You have spent the last three years studying people. People who do things differently than you do, people who know about different things than you do, but still people. Regular people who breathe and hurt and laugh and love and cry just the same as you. I want you to remember that. If you carry that knowledge with you, then I have passed on the most important piece of information that I possess. If you haven't learned that lesson, then nothing else I've taught you really matters. I have much faith in you all, please don't let me down."

Sadie found that she needed to pause after watching that memory. Had Professor Burbage known how close they were to a time when that lesson would be needed? Or had she merely been trying to teach a sense of tolerance to the students in her care? How many students had heard those words over Charity Burbage's years on the faculty? How many students had taken those words to heart? How many of them had been inspired to stand against the lie that was going to engulf their lives in the coming months based on the ideas they had been exposed to in that classroom? Sadly, that was information that Sadie would likely never possess. Was that why she had been killed? Because she was contradicting the lie that Voldemort's followers perpetuated about being a higher class of humans?

The stories about Voldemort had always made him seem so much larger than life. It was like he was this huge, faceless source of evil in the world that had almost succeeded in taking over everything. If he was capable of feeling threatened by a simple teacher saying a few words to her students, how powerful could he actually have been? It couldn't be that simple, could it? Mustn't there be more to the story than that? The all-encompassing, evil dark lord had been afraid of ideas? Yet, isn't that what Luna had implied in her original answer? Charity Burbage had been dangerous because she knew the truth and wasn't afraid to speak it. It was almost funny (in a sad, ironic kind of way) when you stopped to think about it. Everyone had such a built up idea in their minds of how massive an undertaking being heroic had to be, but in the end, it was always the simple things that ended up being heroic – whether it was a boy with a disarming spell or a woman with a passion for teaching truth.

When she played the third memory, Sadie found that they had been out of chronological order for the first time. She would have to remember that and not depend on order in developing her time lines. Like the others, this one took place in the Muggle Studies classroom. Luna and her classmates seemed younger than in the last but older than in the first memory. Luna and Ginny were again sitting together, and Professor Burbage was standing at the front of the room. An unknown woman was sitting in the back scribbling notes on a clipboard. Suddenly, the strange (and rather toad like Sadie thought) woman made a nasty hemming sound as if something were stuck in her throat. Professor Burbage paused in her note giving to look in the woman's direction.

"Is there a problem, Professor Umbridge?" Sadie noticed that Burbage's voice sounded different than she recalled from the earlier memories. She sounded almost patronizing.

"Oh, not at all. Do go on with what you were doing. I think I have seen quite enough. You'll be receiving the results of your evaluation shortly. I'll just say now that you seem to be a very organized young woman who knows what she is about. It is a pity that Dumbledore would waste such teaching skills on such an unnecessary subject."

"Excuse me?" Professor Burbage's voice had gone from vaguely patronizing to barely controlled anger in a matter of moments.

"Oh, nothing against your teaching, dear. You've really done amazingly well with what we all know is a pointless subject of study. Muggle Studies, really. What self-respecting head of a school would waste time on such a thing." Professor Umbridge appeared to be completely oblivious to the fact that Professor Burbage was giving her a death glare or that her fingernails were about to draw blood from the palms of her hands.

"I would like a word with you in the hall, if you please." The anger in her voice was becoming more apparent. Sadie was amazed that the other woman had yet to notice.

"Oh, that won't be necessary. You'll get a full copy of my report later. Go ahead and do what you do, maybe when things are run differently around here we can find a better use for your talents." Her voice was dripping with what she appeared to think was a pleasing tone of comradery.

"Hallway, now." Professor Burbage practically shouted.

"Well, I never." Declared Professor Umbridge in a shocked tone.

Sadie almost squealed in frustration when the memory ended. Had they left the room? Had Luna not seen or heard any more? What had Professor Burbage said to that woman? Who had she been any way? Why was she doing evaluations of the staff? And what had she been suggesting about the school being run differently? If it was Luna's fourth year as she suspected, wouldn't that have been the proper time for the original formation of the DA? The books had always said that the DA had been formed in response to a feeling on the part of the students that they were not being adequately prepared for what they thought was coming. Sadie had always thought that meant that the students thought there was something wrong with the curriculum and had taken it upon themselves to remedy the situation. But what had Constance said in that last, downright snarky letter? She had been too busy being miffed over the insinuation that she try to prove that Luna's father wasn't actually her father. She dug through the papers covering her desk until she found it. There it was "illegal Ministry influence at Hogwarts." What did that mean? The ministry, from what she had pieced together, had seemed to be very complacent toward Voldemort's potential return during that time. Had they been trying to take over at Hogwarts to ensure that the students were being taught the same? In the back of her mind, she had always thought that while noble and all it had been a little grandiose on the part of the students involved to think that they were the ones who had to tackle the problem. That was part of what she had wanted to know from Luna. Why hadn't they trusted that the adults would take care of it? Maybe she had part of that answer now. Maybe they couldn't. If that woman (who obviously had the same basic prejudices that led to the whole mess in the first place) was a ministry official, Sadie's whole viewpoint on the situation was blown.

26 January 2038

Adrienne,

Get me whatever you can find on a Professor Umbridge who was at Hogwarts during the '95-'96 term.

Sadie

**You seem to have spent a large amount of time with Ginny Weasley, Harry Potter, Ronald Weasley, Hermione Granger, and Neville Longbottom during your school years. They were all Gryffindors, and you were a Ravenclaw. How did you end up such good friends with a group of students from a different house? Were you really as good of friends as the stories say?**

_My family lived close to the Weasley's, and I knew Ginny from early childhood. We took the same elective courses beginning in our third year, and we naturally spent time together in them. Our friendship grew from there._

The memory opened in the now familiar Muggle Studies' classroom. It was obviously early – there were very few students in the room, and Professor Burbage had yet to make an appearance. Luna (a third year one Sadie decided) was seated by herself at a table reading an edition of the _Quibbler_ and absentmindedly twirling a piece of her blond hair round her finger. Snow could be seen falling outside the window above Luna's head. As Sadie watched, Ginny Weasley came through the classroom doorway and started to slide into a seat in the back. She glanced around the room, and her gaze settled on the back of Luna's head. She cocked her head to the side and seemed to consider something for a moment before standing up and regathering her books. She made her way down the aisle and balanced her load on the edge of Luna's table.

"Hello, Luna." She said when that girl failed to look up from her reading.

Luna flipped her head in Ginny's direction and blinked up at the redhead. "Hello, Ginny." She replied before turning her eyes back to her paper.

Ginny smiled and shook her head a bit before trying again. "I was wondering if I might sit with you today."

Luna looked up and blinked again. "Don't you usually sit back there?" She asked flicking her hand in the direction of Ginny's previous seat.

"Luna, if I have to listen to any of my housemates rehash who went to the Yule Ball with whom one more time, I am going to cause somebody bodily harm. You would be saving me a week's worth of detentions if you would let me sit with you." Ginny winked at Luna and gave her a disarming smile.

Luna seemed to be considering something for a moment before suddenly asking "Did Professor Burbage talk to you?"

It was Ginny's turn to blink in surprise. "Am I already in trouble for something?" She asked sounding faintly concerned. "Break's just ended."

Luna just stared at her for what felt like an endless amount of time but was probably only a few seconds.

Ginny gave a dramatic sigh. "If you are determined to make me suffer through the excruciating experience of detention just because you won't save me from my own awful temper, I guess I shall have to find somewhere else to sit." Ginny turned and started to walk away.

"Wait." Luna's voice was quiet but commanding. "You can sit here any time you like."

Ginny spun around and looked at Luna questioningly. "Are you sure?"

"I'm sure." Luna responded finally answering Ginny's earlier smile with one of her own.

"I'm glad that's settled then." Ginny stated dropping her things onto the table and plopping down into the chair beside Luna. "What did you do for your holidays?"

Sadie had gotten so used to memories that took place in the Muggle Studies' classroom that she was the one blinking in surprise as she recognized the Hogwarts' library. Luna was again seated at a table, but this time there was no copy of the _Quibbler_ in evidence. She was, instead, working on what appeared to be a potion's essay. Once again, Ginny Weasley made her appearance on the scene. She stomped all the way to the table and practically threw her schoolbag down on the top earning herself a patented ice glare from Madame Pince (who Sadie noted didn't look a day younger than she had during her own years of frequenting that library).

"Ug!" Ginny exclaimed sparing a quick glance in the now shhing Madame Pince's direction before lowering her voice a bit. "I've just come from Defense. She's horrible. It's like the Ministry has been conducting some nasty experiment where they've been crossbreeding foul-tempered giant toads with their employees and one of them has escaped."

Luna looked up at Ginny blinking. "I don't think that's very likely. But if you like, I could ask Daddy to check into it for you." Sadie looked for any sign of sarcasm, but it was clear from Luna's expression that she was being dead earnest.

Ginny's mood instantly broke, and she let out a laugh that she instantly tried to quiet with her hand. She shot another quick glance in Madame Pince's direction, but that woman was no longer paying any attention to them. "I don't think that will be necessary, Luna, but thank you for offering. Would you work on Ancient Runes with me? I've been having an awful time with that new set." Luna nodded, and the memory began to dispel. Sadie paused the playing. Thinking back to the rather toad like woman from the earlier memory, she hurried to her writing desk to send off another note to Adrienne.

26 January 2038

Adrienne,

She may have been the Defense Against the Dark Arts' teacher.

Sadie

This time they were in a different classroom. It was Ancient Runes if the hangings on the walls were any indication. Noting the textbook sitting in front of one of the students, Sadie judged it to be the second year of the course – which would make Luna a fourth year. Sunlight was streaming through the window, and the boy whose textbook Sadie had checked flipped it open to the first page and creased back the binding. It must be the first day of class. Luna was standing in the doorway. It was apparent that she had arrived later than the other students but before the instructor. Each table in the room was already occupied. The little knot of Ravenclaws was making a show of being deep in conversation with each other – all conveniently turned away from where Luna stood. A red-haired girl seemed to notice the sudden degree of busyness on that side of the room and turned toward the door. Ginny smiled at Luna and waved her hand in a beckoning gesture.

"Hey, Luna. Come and sit with us." She said in a voice clearly meant to carry to every part of the room. At least one of the Ravenclaw girls had the decency to blush.

"But, Ginny, aren't we supposed to sit with our houses?" The boy across from her asked in a tone of genuine surprise.

Ginny rolled her eyes and turned back to reply, but Sadie had lost track of the conversation. She was too busy staring at the boy who had spoken. It was Colin, Uncle Colin. He looked just like the picture that her father kept on the desk in his study. She hadn't really thought about the possibility that she would come across him while looking through Luna's memories. She had known that he was at school with her, of course, and their paths must have crossed in the DA. But she hadn't ever really let herself think about it. There was a difference between knowing that something was possible and actually actively thinking about it happening. She had just been so caught up in the prospect of this idea of hers and all its possibilities that she had forgotten to think about what it might be like if she ran into some personal ties along the way.

She felt strange. Not that it wasn't strange to be rummaging through someone else's memories to start with, but this was stranger. Her father never really talked about him. He only made occasional comments about how he had been very brave and had died in the Battle of Hogwarts. She only knew that he had been a DA member because she had found the coin when she was a little girl rummaging through her Dad's desk looking for spare parchment. She'd thought she had found money until she saw that there was writing on the edges. It had said "Harry's come. We're taking Hogwarts back." She hadn't realized then what it was she had found. She didn't put it together until she was older. Sadie had always guessed that the two of them hadn't been very close, and that her Dad's reluctance to talk about it had come from him feeling guilty that he had been so far away while everything was happening to his brother. She had been a little shocked that Luna had thought she would ask him for information on the DA. Maybe Luna had recognized her last name and done a little checking up on her. She couldn't blame her she supposed. She had answered Luna's note as politely as she could without saying what she really thought – that it was highly unlikely that her uncle would have been mailing off lists of the members of subversive organizations by owl to France. She definitely wasn't barmy like Constance had suggested, but she was a little odd.

It felt odd to be looking at him like this. The photograph that her father kept on the desk was a muggle one. This Colin looked so very alive in contrast. He talked with his hands she noticed; the same way that she did when she was excited. He looked . . . bouncy she decided – like he had more energy than he could use and it was going to come bursting out of him at any moment. Realizing that she had completely missed what was going on, she made an effort to refocus her attention to the situation at hand. Luna was seated at the table with Ginny and Colin and another girl who had scooted her chair back slightly. She was sitting with her arms crossed tightly, and she was definitely pouting. Ginny had apparently decreed that Luna was sitting with them whether anyone else liked it or not, and the girl was seething in silence. Colin didn't seem to be bothered by it; he looked like he had picked up with whatever conversation had been going before the interruption. When he asked Luna a question, Ginny used the moment of her distraction to give a meaningful glare at the pouting girl. The girl looked startled, then scared (Sadie couldn't really blame her – Ginny was looking rather dangerous at the moment), and finally decided that it was imperative that she start reading the first chapter of her textbook. The memory ended there.

_Most children in my age group grew up hearing tales of Harry Potter as bedtime stories. I wasn't one of them. Ginny used to talk about him sometimes, and I remember asking my mother about him. She said that there were lots of stories that people told about Harry, but nobody knew which ones were true and which ones were not. He was, after all, a boy just like anyone else who should be allowed to grow up into whoever he was going to be without having to listen to meddling people telling him whom they thought he should be because of the stories they had heard. _

_When I got to school, there were always stories about Harry making the idle gossip rounds. I tried not to listen to most of them. I didn't meet him myself until my fourth year. He was kind, and he was loyal – and he was very much in need of people who would see him as Harry rather than their pieced together idea of what Harry should be. It would have been difficult not to become friends with him._

Sadie stopped the memories from playing. Adrienne had been correct at the beginning – having to look beyond the Harry Potter angle had been a blessing. Everyone always focused on him. She wasn't going to go down that road. Her writing was going to be different. She would just skip over the Harry Potter memories. Besides, if Constance was right, she had no desire to watch memories of Luna and Harry snogging. At the thought of Constance, she felt a sudden surge of anger rush through her. What else had Constance said? That Harry had let the kids in the DA think that they were capable of fighting back without ever teaching them how? That he had gotten some of them killed because they were in over their heads in the final battle? Had he gotten Colin killed? Had Colin believed that he was capable of fighting Death Eaters because Harry Potter had convinced him that he could? He shouldn't even have been there. He was muggle born. He would have been expelled that year and spent it in hiding. He wouldn't even have been there for the battle if that stupid coin hadn't called him back. "Harry's come. We're taking Hogwarts back." She thought about those words in light of what Constance had told her. So, the great Harry Potter had wanted Voldemort to be distracted to give himself an advantage, had he? He, of all people, would have known what he was sending them out to fight against. What were the lives of some nameless, faceless follower kids in the grand scheme of the greater good?

Kind? Loyal? Clearly, Luna was every bit as much in the Harry Potter fan club as Constance had suggested she might be. She didn't need to see that kind of blindly devoted memory. This wasn't Harry Potter's story anymore. She pushed ahead to the next answer.

_My friendship with Ronald Weasley didn't come quite as easily. Teenagers are difficult creatures, I think. So often they feel they must hide who they are from those around them. Ronald was gruff, often thoughtless with the things he said to those with whom he came into contact. You had to take care that you remembered the boy underneath all that – the one who was sweet and thoughtful and kindhearted. The one you saw in the moments when he forgot to put up the pretense of the unsure adolescent and let the boy he was meant to be shine through instead. That's what friends do after all. They recognize who you are even when you aren't sure of it yourself._

As the memory came into focus, Sadie recognized the familiar feel of the yard and realized that she was back at The Burrow. A very, very young Luna (probably only three or four) stood to the side watching as the equally young looking Ginny Weasley sat on the ground crying over what was obviously a scraped knee. A boy not much older than the girls was kneeling on the ground next to Ginny and speaking in a soothing voice while he patted her gently on the head.

"Sh, Gin-Gin," he was murmuring. "It's okay. Don't cry. Please don't cry. Can I help you get up? Let's go see Mum. She'll make it feel better, and she'll prolly let you have a cookie."

At the word cookie, Ginny's face cleared and the sobbing slowed to a mild hiccoughing sound. The red-haired boy (who Sadie supposed was a young Ron Weasley) pulled Ginny to her feet. She made a rather large production of leaning against him and limping on her way, but he didn't protest her actions. He merely pulled her arm around his shoulders and led her in the direction of the front door of the house.

The young Luna followed behind chewing on her fingers with her head cocked to the side as she contemplated the actions of the siblings. She sighed and mumbled to no one in particular "Brothers are nice."

The memory ended and refocused in a hallway at Hogwarts. Luna was sprawled across the floor with books, parchment, quills, and myriad other items scattered from a torn bookbag in every conceivable direction. A gaggle of students in Slytherin robes stood nearby giggling rather malevolently at the sight. Not one was making any motion indicating that they would be helping Luna up. A few were even kicking items farther down the hall.

One member of the group spoke up, "Must be a new kind of creature, Loony. Sneaks up behind you and knocks you down. Best have your father investigate. I'm sure he'll be interested to hear." The ill-intended snickering continued down the hall as the group moved on. A red headed boy who had rounded the opposite corner in the middle of the Slytherin's comments took in the scene and immediately knelt to gather together the scattered objects.

"You all right?" He asked her.

Luna merely nodded and began to gather her own pile of belongings. The two worked in silence while everything was collected. As he handed her the last bottle of ink (miraculously unbroken), Ron Weasley spoke again. "Slytherins. Right nasty creatures all around. I reckon somebody should see about locking them up and studying them for a while." He gave Luna a wink and a grin and continued on his way down the hall. Luna double blinked after his retreating figure before smiling and walking off in the opposite direction.

Luna was walking on what Sadie recognized to be the Hogwarts' grounds. It appeared to be very cold – snow covered the ground, and Luna's breath was visible in little puffs that hovered in front of her face. She didn't appear to be going anywhere in particular. Rather, she seemed to be out enjoying a winter ramble. The scenery appeared untouched. It was obviously very early in the morning. The top layer of snow was fresh and stretched out in unsullied whiteness in each direction but one. The faintest impression could be seen stretching out in front of Luna. The footprints had been partially blown over, but were still visible. Luna didn't seem to be following them – she seemed oblivious to their presence. She simply appeared to be heading towards the same set of trees that they led toward. As they came closer to the trees, Sadie spotted a figure sitting under one of them. Sadie soon recognized the individual as a Weasley boy – no other families seemed to produce quite that shade of red hair. It must be Ron. This was, after all, one of Luna's memories about him. He was seated in the snow with his head resting in his hands that were braced by the elbows on his knees. He must be terribly wet and somewhat frozen, but his posture seemed to indicate that he had weightier things on his mind than mere physical comfort.

Luna paused and watched him for a few moments as if contemplating whether or not she should disturb him. Apparently she decided that she should, for she came closer and called out a greeting. "Hello, Ronald."

The boy started and turned his head in her direction. His voice sounded flat when he answered her "Hello, Luna." He seemed to be searching for something further to say before he settled on "Kind of cold for an early walk, isn't it?"

Luna cocked her head to the side and made sure that he was making eye contact with her. "Warmer than sitting in a snow bank, I should think."

Ron gave a self-depreciating shrug and turned to gaze at the unbroken snow. "Sometimes it's easier to think away from people."

Luna seemed to sense the tension emanating from the boy and refrained from saying anything in response. She merely stood patiently and waited for him to continue.

Ron seemed to accept the unspoken invitation. "Have you ever messed something up really badly, Luna?" He inquired, the flat inflection in his voice being replaced with something sad and somehow resigned. "Not schoolwork or simple stuff that you can fix, but people. Have you ever messed up so badly that you don't even know if the people involved will give you a chance to fix it?" Seeming to sense the rhetorical nature of the question, Luna remained silent. She simply sat down next to the clearly troubled boy in the snow.

Ron continued, "I've made such a mess of things. It's all tangled up, and I don't think I can untangle it because no matter what I do people are going to get hurt. I don't want people to get hurt, but they're going to be. Whether I fix things or leave them like they are. I hate that I'm the one who mucked everything up. I hate that I'm hurting her. I hate it when girls cry. Do they do that on purpose, Luna, because they know how badly it makes blokes feel?"

The memory faded into the sound of Luna's voice.

_My friendship with Neville Longbottom just sort of came to be. We were in the same places at the same time. We had the same friends. It was a natural progression that we would end up being friends with each other. Sometimes something bigger than yourself recognizes the need for certain people to enter your life and creates an opportunity. I like to think that that's what happened to Neville and myself._

A group of students were gathered in a room that Sadie could not identify. They seemed to be spreading themselves out – leaving singly or in pairs at various intervals. Luna stepped out into the hall, and Sadie found herself in a hallway she recognized from Hogwarts. But, if she remembered correctly there were no doors in that particular hallway. She turned to see where Luna had come from and found herself face to face with an empty stretch of wall. That was bizarre. She turned to see where Luna had gotten to and spotted her toward the end of the hallway hurrying (although Luna was so graceful in her movements that hurrying seemed a most inappropriate word to describe the process) to catch up with a slightly chubby boy who was walking away with a rather preoccupied air.

"Neville." Luna called in a quietly pitched voice that nevertheless garnered the boy's attention for her. He turned to face her, and Sadie found herself looking into the face of her old Herbology professor. This boy seemed different from the man she was acquainted with however. Her Professor Longbottom was laid back and easy going. He chuckled through lectures and told jokes to lines of queing students that he passed in the halls. There was no laughter to be found in this boy's expression. He looked serious and troubled and determined. His eyes were shadowed, and he showed every indication of someone who hadn't slept well for several days.

He didn't respond to Luna's greeting. He merely stood still until she had caught up to him and waited for her to continue. "You did really well tonight." She told him looking up to meet his eyes.

The determined expression faltered, and he appeared to finally actually see Luna standing in front of him. "Thanks?" The word was awkward and questioning as if he were unsure of what he had heard and didn't want to embarrass himself.

Luna smiled at him in an encouraging fashion. "I mean it you know. You've been doing quite well. Not just tonight, but altogether recently. I wanted to tell you because I suspect maybe you don't hear it often enough."

Without another word, Luna spun on her heel and walked off in the other direction leaving a surprised looking Neville Longbottom in her wake.

The next memory opened in the Hogwarts' library. Luna was once again surrounded by a table full of books while she worked on an essay – it appeared to be Herbology on this occasion. It wasn't Ginny Weasley who disturbed her study time this time. A somewhat nervous looking Neville Longbottom approached her and gingerly sat his bag on the table across from her. He paused a moment waiting for Luna to acknowledge his presence. She didn't. He slid quietly into the chair in front of his bag and again waited for some sign that Luna had noticed him there. She continued to work without looking up from her parchment. Just when it appeared that Neville was getting ready to give up and leave, Luna spoke. "Was there something you wanted, Neville? Or did a wrackspurt knock it from your head?"

Visibly relaxing, Neville smiled at the blond who still hadn't looked up from the parchment on which she was scribbling furiously. "Um, no. To the second question that is. I don't think I know what a . . .never mind. I did want . . . that is I was going to ask . . . well."

"That's odd," Luna interrupted him. "They don't usually come into the library."

"You miss it too, don't you?" Neville finally spat out.

That got Luna's full attention. Her head snapped up from the parchment, and her eyes locked with the boy's. She didn't ask (as Sadie expected her to do) what it was that he was going on about. Rather, she nodded her head and replied "I do."

"Do you feel like we're missing out on something important?" He continued, the nervousness leaving his voice. "Like we should be doing something instead of sitting round school pretending that everything is fine? Does that sound crazy?"

"Just because the DA isn't meeting any more," Luna was saying, "doesn't mean that we've forgotten why we were meeting. It doesn't mean that we have to stop being ready for what's coming."

"So, what do we do now?" Neville was looking at Luna with a hopeful expression spreading across his features.

Luna plunged a hand into her robes and drew out a small, golden coin from her pocket. "We make sure we're ready when we're needed," she said.

The memory shifted, and the library disappeared. Luna was standing with Neville's arm draped around her shoulders. He appeared to be limping and was leaning rather heavily against her small frame. She, however, was not protesting. She guided him into a chair and took the seat beside him. Sadie looked around and noticed that they seemed to be toward the back of a large crowd gathered near the lake on the Hogwarts' grounds. Mixed with students and faculty were a large variety of people – some of whom had to be ministry officials. It had to be Albus Dumbledore's funeral. No other occasion would have warranted such a large group being present on the school grounds. Well, except for the final battle itself, and this was definitely not that.

"I can't believe he's gone," Neville was saying in a hushed voice to Luna. She just looked at him with a hard to read expression. "What do we do now?" He asked her. "With Dumbledore gone everything is just going to fall apart." His voice had a blank quality to it that was difficult for Sadie to reconcile with her own memories of Professor Longbottom's perpetually cheery voice.

Luna merely looked at the older boy with an intensity so great that he turned to see what it was that she was doing. Only when she was sure that she had his complete and undivided attention did she say anything at all. "He's gone – what he was fighting for isn't. It doesn't mean that we get to bow our heads and hide from everything. He's gone, but we're not. That makes it our responsibility to pick up the pieces. To finish what he started. It's our job now."

Neville was staring at her with a look approaching awe. He reached over and gently picked up her hand in his own before squeezing her fingers. "I'm glad you're here to remind me."

Luna smiled at him through teary eyes and turned her head to face the officiating wizard who had begun to speak at the front. The two of them sat silently, hands intertwined, while the funeral proceeded. The memory faded out.

_Life would be rather boring if you spent it surrounded by people who thought exactly the same ways about exactly the same things at exactly the same times as yourself. If you look at it from that perspective, it made perfect sense for Hermione Granger and me to be friends. Yes, we really were quite good friends. We still are in fact. You are only limited in your friendships with people who view life in a different manner by insecurity about your own thinking. If you need to surround yourself by those who will justify your own thoughts, it's because deep down you think your own thoughts are in need of justification. _

_Hermione and I didn't always agree. We even argued on occasion, but we respected each other for being steadfast in our own beliefs. That, I think, makes a better foundation for a lasting friendship than any amount of commonality on common matters could ever build._

Luna was back in the library. Hadn't she ever just hung out in the Ravenclaw common room? Although, given the memories Sadie had seen concerning her housemates, that might not have been such a pleasant place to be. She clearly got on better with that little group of Gryffindors – why didn't they just hang out in the all-house common room? Wait. Hadn't one of the professors said that that was a fairly recent addition to Hogwarts? Had it not been in existence yet when Luna was a student? Sadie scanned the room looking for Hermione Granger to make her appearance. These were supposed to be memories of her after all. She had looked over the room twice before a girl with crazy curls haphazardly swept up into a ponytail walked up to Luna's table and hovered beside it. Sadie studied the girl's face – it was Hermione Granger. She had overlooked her because of the hair. She never would have realized. Had no one introduced the poor muggle born to the wonders of Sleakeasy's yet? Did she not have roommates to teach her these things? Ginny Weasley? Somebody?

"Luna, I was wondering if I might speak to you for a moment?" Hermione sounded hesitant – almost as if she was unsure how Luna was going to respond to her question. Her hesitation seemed warranted for when Luna looked up there was no smile as there had been for Ginny Weasley or Neville Longbottom. Instead, an aloof expression that seemed somehow out of place on Luna's features accompanied the uplifted eyebrow that was apparently going to be Hermione's invitation to continue.

It was obviously enough encouragement for Hermione because she did continue. "I know that we didn't get off to a very pleasant start when we first met." Luna's other eyebrow raised giving her an almost disdainful look (Sadie was tempted to laugh. Words of wisdom spouting, perpetually unaffected by those around her Luna Lovegood looking disdainful was an almost comic combination.). "I was hoping that we could fix that." The disdainful expression on Luna's face was easing up a bit, and Hermione looked heartened by that fact. "Some of us were thinking that we aren't going to be learning much in Defense this year, and we thought that maybe we should get together and try to fix that. Harry's going to teach us." Hermione paused and took a deep breath. "Look, Luna, I know you believe Harry, and he needs all the people who believe in him that he can get right now. If you're interested, we're meeting at the Hog's Head next Hogsmeade weekend. Okay?"

Luna nodded at Hermione and went back to reading her textbook. Hermione stayed standing at the edge of the table for a moment staring down at Luna before turning and walking back to another table equally buried under books.

The new memory opened on the hallway in front of the great hall. Sadie could tell that it was mealtime because clumps of students were going in and out of the large doorway. Luna, in contrast, was walking by herself toward the main staircase. "Luna, wait!" A voice called from behind her. Luna and Sadie both turned to see Hermione Granger sprinting toward her with her bookbag clutched between her hands.

"Are you heading toward the library?" Hermione asked a little out of breath. Luna merely nodded in response. "Would you mind if I walked with you?"

Luna shrugged her shoulders in indifference and began to climb the stairs. "Look, Luna, I know you don't like me much, and that's fine, but I need your help with something. Not for me," she added quickly, "it's for Harry." She paused to give Luna a chance to respond, and when she didn't, she continued to talk. "It's really hard for him with Umbridge always watching him, and people trying to goad him into talking about what happened when V-Voldemort came back. He needs to tell his story, so that people will know what's really happening out there. It's dangerous, and it's just going to get worse. It isn't fair that the ministry is going to leave everyone unprepared just because they're being idiots. I was hoping that you could help. Well, more like your father really. What does someone have to do to get a story into the _Quibbler_?"

Sadie was beginning to feel very put out with Hermione Granger. She might not seem nearly as unpleasant as Constance had described, but she only seemed to speak to Luna when she needed something from her. Was this what Luna considered being "good friends?" Good friends didn't just use each other when they wanted something. Had Luna had so few real friends in her life that she didn't know the difference?

Luna stopped walking and turned to face Hermione on the steps. A slight smile was tugging at the corners of her mouth, and her eyes were twinkling. "I don't not like you." She stated simply as if that had been the substance of Hermione's statement. She began her trek up the steps again while Hermione stood rooted to the same spot with a look of puzzlement across her face. Luna had gotten fifteen or so steps ahead of her before she seemed to realize that Hermione was no longer with her. She looked down at Hermione with an expression of confusion. "Were you coming then?" She asked. Hermione nodded slowly and began moving almost warily up the stairs. When she reached Luna's level, the two girls began walking together. "So," Luna said in a friendly tone of voice, "Daddy will want details."

The new memory opened in what Sadie recognized as the prefect's meeting room. A tall, skinny boy in Ravenclaw robes was almost shouting at the girl wearing the head badge. Hermione was sitting between Luna and Colin and rolling her eyes. Luna was staring at the ceiling as if it were the most intriguing thing she had ever laid eyes upon, and Colin kept peering around Hermione to look at Luna and then shifting his eyes back to the shouting boy with an unbelieving expression on his face. When Sadie focused on what the boy was saying, she shared Colin's incredulous expression. How could anyone be that insensitive to someone else's feelings? Granted, Luna seemed to always take things in stride, but why wasn't the head boy or the head girl telling that sorry excuse for a prefect to get over himself and grow up?

"I won't do it any more. That's what. She's driving me absolutely barmy. Wrackspurts, and blimring something or others and couple horned I don't even know whats. I can't do it any more. I can't do one more night of rounds with her. I'll resign if I have to. I mean it." The boy paused for air, and the head girl took advantage of the silence.

"I know you're upset," she began in what was clearly intended to be a calming tone.

The whiny boy didn't let her finish. "Upset? Upset doesn't cover the half of it. Months I've put up with this rubbish. What was Dumbledore thinking? She's got no business being a prefect in the first place. I won't work with her anymore and that's the end of it."

Most of the room had joined Colin in peering back and forth between the boy and Luna who still seemed oblivious to the scene taking place in front of her. "Now, there's no call for that kind of talk." The boy wearing the head badge interrupted. "If you can't even manage to be civil to people sitting right in front of you, maybe you do need to resign." The whiny boy snapped his mouth shut, choking off whatever reply he had been about to make.

Suddenly, Luna spoke up from her seat beside Hermione. "That's all right. He doesn't need to resign. If I'm causing problems, then I should be the one who goes."

Hermione was instantly on her feet, and it was clear even to Sadie (who had no previous experience in reading Hermione's expressions) that now would not be a good time to try to argue with her. "Oh no, you most definitely will not. Luna Lovegood, you earned that prefect's badge, and you are going to keep it. This utterly ridiculous and completely pointless conversation has gone on long enough, and I'm ending it. I'll trade patrolling duties. I'll go with Luna. Everybody happy now? Good."

The head boy (indicating a most astonishing lack of brain power Sadie thought) decided to protest. "You can't. You're not from the same house. We always split up duties by houses."

"There isn't anything in the rule book that says it has to be done that way. It's just a stupid tradition. Get over it." Hermione's tone suggested that she was about to lose what little patience she had had at the beginning of her suggestion. "You have a problem. I'm giving you a solution. Take it."

"What about Ron?" The head girl spoke up. "He'll be getting paired up with him." She gestured at the whiny boy who had caused all the trouble. "Shouldn't he get a say in that?"

Hermione smiled a rather unpleasant looking smile. "I guess he should have bothered to show up at the meeting then." Sadie glanced around the room – Ron Weasley wasn't there.

The head boy clapped his hands together to get everyone's attention. "True enough. Consider yourself switched. Meeting adjourned."

Hermione and Luna lingered in the room after everyone else had left. "You didn't have to do that you know."

"I know," replied Hermione. "But I wasn't about to let you quit just because of some whiny, narrow-minded loser. Besides, you can't have liked patrolling with that nitwit, and I would dearly like to have some decent conversation if I have to roam the halls in the middle of the night."

"Nine to ten thirty is hardly the middle of the night." Luna stated matter of factly.

"You know what I meant," Hermione said with a smile. "I never get to talk to girls anymore. Ginny's always busy with Quidditch or her boyfriend. And my roommates . . . well . . . you know."

"Things haven't gotten any better?" Luna's voice had gone soft and gentle.

"If by better you mean that I no longer have to listen to Lavender's gushing about how much happier Ron is without me around because she is now permanently attached to Ron by the lips, then yes. It's loads better."

"Don't you . . ."

Hermione cut her off. "Please, Luna. Don't. You're the only one who doesn't treat me like I'm fragile. Don't you start as well."

Luna nodded in understanding while Hermione seemed to remember something. "Oh yes, I nearly forgot. This is for you." She held an Ancient Runes' text out towards Luna.

"What?" Luna looked genuinely confused.

"Ginny said you haven't had your book for class for a couple of weeks. I don't care how good the notes are; you need the textbook. It's my old one. You can give it back at the end of term. Do I want to know what happened to your copy?" Hermione's voice sounded a little terse, but it wasn't directed at Luna.

Luna shrugged, "The same as the others. Thank you."

It was Hermione's turn to shrug. "That's what friends do." The two girls walked into the hall together discussing a potentially tricky translation that Luna was currently working on, and the memory disappeared.

Sadie was looking at her blank wall once again. That hadn't been what she had expected. They really were friends – the whole lot of them. She had always pictured them as more along the lines of acquaintances. All the stories that didn't focus solely on Harry Potter had always been "The Trio this" and "The Trio that." It didn't really leave the impression that they had let other people into their little world. Clearly, Luna had been. Well, she didn't really know about Harry, and she was still too worked up to view that section. Another flicker of grief for the uncle she was never going to get to know shot through her. Luna and Ron had been good enough friends for him to open up to her when he was upset, and Hermione and Luna had obviously been closer than anyone had realized.

Sadie had found herself liking Luna better than she had ever expected from the descriptions she had always heard of the brilliant, but out there species researcher. She was glad that Luna hadn't been shunned for the entirety of her Hogwarts' career. It was good to know that there were people in her life then who had appreciated her. She had so many questions now though. How had Hermione and Luna gone from what appeared to be a bit of animosity in the first memory to the easy friendship they seemed to display by the last one? Was it really all in that one conversation in the middle? Or had it taken longer for them to learn that respect for each other of which Luna had spoken? Had Luna and Neville been dating? Or had that been friendly comforting she had seen at Dumbledore's funeral? What about Constance's theory about Luna and Harry Potter? It was no good she realized. It didn't matter how angry she was at Potter right now. She was supposed to be an unbiased author. If she couldn't even watch a few minutes worth of memories, she had no business trying to write about what had really happened. She was going to have to watch the Harry moments.

One hour later, Sadie was curled up in her chair with a hot cup of tea and a throw blanket. Constance had been wrong about Harry not caring. There was no way that the boy she had just watched grieving over the death of his godfather, the boy was shaking as he told a scruffy looking reporter about Cedric Diggory's death, or the boy who had taken an ecstatic Luna to an exclusive Christmas party "as friends" didn't care about the people around him. If anything, he seemed to care too much. Maybe Constance's parents had misunderstood. Maybe he had been so worried that the DA had been an honest attempt at helping them prepare. Maybe it had just gone wrong. Speaking of things going wrong, clearly, there had been something wrong with Ron and Hermione as well. Who was Lavender? She would have to get Adrienne to check on that for her. Speaking of Adrienne, she hadn't owled her back in a while. Was she having difficulty finding information?

26 January 2038

Adrienne,

Find a housemate of Hermione Granger's named Lavender for me.

Sadie

She shoved the pile of papers on her desk off onto the floor to make room to work on her rough draft. Perhaps she should go ahead and send Luna her next set of questions. That rough draft was due in five days as well. It would probably be better to go ahead and have it on hand for whenever she got ready. It would just be hard to not go ahead and watch it when it came. She was getting addicted to this story. Deadlines were deadlines. There would be no watching the next set until this rough draft was finished. She could do that. She had self-discipline.

Fourteen hours later Sadie woke to the kind of neck cramps that can only be obtained by falling asleep with your head on your desk. That's what she got for trying to go for so long without sleeping. She would do a charm to loosen up her neck muscles – unfortunately she had fallen asleep on her wand arm, and it was far too numb to move. She waited rather impatiently for the uncomfortable prickling sensation shooting up her arm to fade away. At least she had finished her rough draft. Now if only Luna had already gotten back to her. She checked the slot under her window where owls could drop mail when she wasn't home. It was empty. She had mailed the parchments to Luna, hadn't she? She was quite certain that she had. Why didn't she have mail from Adrienne either?

27 January 2038

Adrienne,

Are you having any luck at all?

Sadie

She began polishing her draft of Luna's early childhood while she waited. She found herself intrigued all over again. Surely, the answers to most of her questions had to be somewhere in Adrienne's archives. She looked up as an owl dropped a letter into her slot. She had been so focused on her writing that she hadn't even registered the tapping on her window.

27 January 2038

Dear Miss Creevey,

I'm not your personal secretary. If you want information from the archives, you may fill out a Ministry Archive Information Request form like everyone else. I'm sure Mr. Perkins will be happy to see to your request, and he should get back to you in the next year or so.

Sincerely,

Adrienne Finch-Fletchley

Junior Secretary, Archives Department

Ministry of Magic

Sadie stared in disbelief at the parchment in her hand. What in the world had gotten into Adrienne? It had been Adrienne's idea to move Sadie's requests to the top of the pile to start with; she hadn't asked her for that. And personal secretary? What was that all about? Her eyes fell to the copy of her Lavender request to Adrienne that was lying on top of the pile on her floor. "Find." That's what it said. No please, no thank you. Just "Find it." Oh, no. A sense of dread filled Sadie as she went digging through the pile of papers looking for all of her recent notes to Adrienne. She couldn't have. She would never have. She had. She hadn't meant to turn into a demanding, bossy berk. She had just been caught up in what she was doing, and she hadn't even paid any attention to what she was writing. She hadn't really thought about Adrienne during the whole process at all. She was just using her to get information . . . like she had just been angry at Hermione Granger for doing when she thought she was just using Luna when she needed her.

This was not going to be an easy fix. It was going to take some serious effort on her part. And, like Hermione Granger had before her, she was going to have to step out and take a chance that her overtures would be rejected. She had one advantage over Hermione in her approach of Luna, however, she happened to know for a fact that Adrienne had a weakness for cookies. Today she was going to use that information. She had flooing to do.


	4. Questions Answered

Chapter 3 – Questions Answered

28 January 2038

Sadie,

All right already. That's enough. I forgive you. Not that I haven't enjoyed the every half-hour cookie delivery, but Mr. Perkins is starting to freak out. He seems to think that the cookie crumbs are going to get lifted by an updraft and become ground into the pages of the 18th century wedding registry. Don't ask. It's a long story.

I'm sorry about my letter as well. I was getting perturbed by the imperious tone. You have seriously got to learn to breathe while you are working. You get too caught up, Sade. We worry about you. I'm betting you crashed in the middle of writing at some point in the last two days. You probably haven't eaten anything but tea for a while either. I would send you some cookies, but I'm going to eat them all. They're my reward for scrambling round like a servant girl getting your research done for you. Speaking of which, while you are handing out apologies, I suggest you talk to Drake. In person would be preferable. Something about being referred to as whiny, and he does need to talk to you.

Read Luna's DA list, Sadie. It's important.

Adrienne

28 January 2038

Adrienne,

I am pleased that my cunning plan to return to your good graces has worked. I really am sorry about the imperious tone. I will make sure it does not happen again. I will owl Drake when I get a minute, I promise. I just cannot go in person right now. Otherwise, I would have been groveling with the plate of cookies directly in front of your desk. I am waiting for an owl from Luna, and I have to be ready to write a draft for it as soon as it gets here. I am kind of pushing the first of February deadline here. As for the DA list, I cannot find it in the pile. I will look for it later. Whatever it is can wait until I finish that next chapter.

Sadie

28 January 2038

Sadie,

Maybe it would be better if you met your deadline first. You just aren't allowed to get mad at me when you do read it because I didn't tell you. Because I did tell you, you just didn't listen to me, okay?

Adrienne

28 January 2038

Drake,

I am really sorry about the tone in that last letter. Things are just so hectic right now, but I know that that is not any excuse for the way I have been acting. You know how I get when I am busy, but that is not any excuse either. I will make a valiant effort to be better. Please forgive me?

Sadie

28 January 2038

Adrienne,

You are being weirder than normal. I promise I will read the DA list in its apparently fascinating entirety after I am caught up on my deadline.

Sadie

28 January 2038

Sade,

So, do you want the information I found or are you immersed in writing?

Adrienne

28 January 2038

Adrienne,

I am still waiting for Luna to get back to me. I cannot imagine what is taking her so long. She has always been quite prompt in her replies before. Of course I want whatever you found.

Sadie

28 January 2038

Sadie,

Where shall we start? Let's go with the Prewett boys, shall we? Molly Weasely nee Prewett was the oldest of three children. Her younger brothers were Fabian and Gideon Prewett. I found an engagement announcement for Gideon Prewett and a Jane Fredericks from February of 1980. That means that the bloke with Elise Lovegood nee Fenwick must be Fabian Prewett. Aren't my eliminative reasoning skills brilliant?

Jane Fredericks isn't in the birth registry, so she's either muggle born or foreign. My money would be on muggle born since not very many persons immigrated here during that time (too much "civil unrest" is actually how the papers described it at the time, not what I would have chosen for a descriptive term for Voldemort's original entrance to society, but no one asked me). I found her twice in other vital statistic records. She is listed as a witness to the marriage of Lily Evans and James Potter, and, get this, she is also listed as Harry Potter's godmother. Please hold your applause for my amazing skills until the end because . . .

But, wait, there's more. This is also where the story takes a sad turn. The Prewett/Fredericks' engagement announcement says that they were to be married in June of 1980, but they never made it to the wedding. Gideon and Fabian Prewett were killed together in a Death Eater attack in April of that year. There was still a June wedding, however, Elise Fenwick and Xenophilius Lovegood got married that June. Jane Fredericks became Harry Potter's godmother in August. She was also killed under "suspicious" circumstances. That means it was probably Death Eaters who got in a hurry and neglected to cast a dark mark. That took place in September.

It was no wonder that Elise didn't seem too keen on flipping through her old picture albums. I wouldn't want to have to relive that kind of trauma. I still can't help you with what she was working on when she died. There are just too many Death Eater attacks in the indexes to try to go through them all without a name for reference.

Adrienne

29 January 2038

Adrienne,

You are amazing, and I am applauding. Can you hear? That was a treasure trove of information. I have absolutely no idea what to do with any of it, but it is good to know. Oh, wait. I do know one thing to do with one piece of that information.

Sadie

29 January 2038

Sadie,

You're forgiven.

Drake

29 January 2038

Constance,

Thank you again for your attention to my work. I am, naturally, very busy working on my assignments. I did want you to know that I did take the time to look into one of your suggestions. Luna Lovegood was born in April of 1981. The Prewett boys died in April of 1980. It is, therefore, not possible for Luna to be a Prewett child. I just thought I would let you know.

Sadie

That should keep her out of my hair for a bit Sadie was thinking as she sent off the owl. When she heard the tapping at her window, she thought that it had come back. Was one treat not enough anymore? Luckily, it was a different owl entirely. Sadie took the parchment eagerly and wasted no time in breaking the seal. What had taken Luna so long this time?


	5. Luna's Sixth Year

Chapter 4 – Luna's Sixth Year at Hogwarts

**Why did the DA decide to reform without Harry Potter during the year that Hogwarts was under Voldemort's control? Did you really think that you were fighting Voldemort? You were just children. Wouldn't it have been easier and safer for everyone to keep your heads down and wait for everything to be worked out?**

_Easier? If by easier you mean would it have been less trouble to put ourselves first than to care about what was going on around us, then yes. Would it have been easier to give our approval by silence of the lies that were being taught by the Carrows? Would it have been easier to sit and do nothing while little first years were chained up in the dungeon for asking questions? Would it have been easier to pretend that since we were "just children," we didn't bear any responsibility for what happened around us? Would it have been easier to live with ourselves afterwards knowing that we had done nothing to fight the tide? I suppose that it depends on what you consider easier._

_We had no illusions about taking on Voldemort. We were not ignorant children suffering from delusions of grandeur. We knew what was going on in the world outside of Hogwarts, and we knew what the potential consequences of taking a stand were. Most of us had seen them first hand by that point in time. Hogwarts was our corner of the world, and it was being corrupted. We were there. We knew what was happening. If we weren't willing to fight for it ourselves, why should we expect anyone else to be willing to come charging in to save the day. The darkness had come to us, and we could either try to push it back or choose to let it have our ground. The trouble with trying to ignore darkness is that that option just lets darkness win by default. All it has to do is wait for the light to go out, and it has won. We didn't want to be safe in the dark. Only ignorant children would have thought that such a thing was possible. We decided we would rather take our chances trying to keep the light alive._

The scene this time was the Hogwarts' Express. It looked very different from the train rides of Sadie's own Hogwarts' years. It was quiet – eerily so. There was no laughter echoing up and down the train, there were no shouted hellos to friends who had been missed over the summer, and the students who were speaking did so in hushed voices. Luna was making her way into a compartment already occupied by Ginny Weasley and Neville Longbottom. Their conversation abruptly ceased the instant they heard the click of the door opening, and both of them visibly relaxed when they saw that it was Luna joining them. She carefully closed the door behind her and looked expectantly at Ginny.

"They've gone then?" Luna asked softly.

Ginny nodded in the affirmative. "It's not like two of them could have come back anyway. Mum's not taking it well, but we rather expected that."

Neville again glanced at the closed compartment door before joining the conversation. "Look. None of us know exactly what we're walking into today. We could make some guesses based on how the _Prophet_ (Luna rolled her eyes at the mention of that paper.) is reporting things, but I think we can all agree that it's going to be bad. Right?"

Ginny's voice sounded rather angry to Sadie as she responded to Neville's question. "What's your point? Yes, it's going to be bad. It's going to be colossally unpleasant. Our education is going to be directed by the murderer of our previous headmaster, and he'll be being overseen by evil incarnate. Half our friends are being hunted down by the puppet stringed ministry, and we're not allowed to do anything to try and help them. Was that the recap you were looking to get, Neville? Because I think we're all clear on the gravity of the situation. We're stuck playing good children at the dark side indoctrination camp until some stupid, noble people figure out a way to save the world." Ginny ended her statement with a dramatic flop back into the seat cushions. Neville's features clearly conveyed shock as he stared at her from across the compartment. Luna, on the other hand, was observing Ginny with a vaguely amused air.

"Rough summer then?" She asked Ginny while raising one eyebrow at her.

"You could say that," Ginny replied while the scowl began to clear from her face.

"Quite finished with that display?" Luna responded through a growing smile.

"For now," Ginny answered with a reciprocal grin. "Sorry about that. What were you saying?" She asked looking toward Neville whose look of shock had been replaced with one of confusion and what might have been a little bit of fear (not that Sadie could really blame him).

After continuing to stare at Ginny for a moment, he shook his head and muttered "Girls are downright mental." Seeing that both Luna and Ginny were staring at him expectantly now, he cleared his throat and tried to finish his previous thought. "I was just thinking that maybe that part about not being able to help isn't right. Maybe we can't help them with whatever it is they've gone off to do, but that doesn't mean that we have to sit around twiddling our thumbs, does it?" Neville's voice had gradually gained confidence throughout his statement. By the time he had finished, all traces of nervousness had gone. Those weren't the tones of a follower or a hanger on. That was the tone of voice of someone who was ready to lead – whether he knew it yet or not. Sadie was impressed. She had known Professor Longbottom for seven years of school. She had never heard that tone of command in his voice before. Maybe all the war stories weren't really exaggerations. Maybe he had been every bit in the thick of things as those dismissed out of hand stories had made him sound. It was Ginny's turn to appear shocked. She was obviously trying to process the thought of Neville in what was an apparently unusual role. Luna didn't seem surprised at all (she was actually looking rather proud), so it fell to her to continue the conversation.

"Did you have something in particular in mind?"

"I was thinking about Umbridge. Remember how badly she thought she wanted control of the school until she actually got it? I seem to recall a whole series of events that made the experience less than pleasant for her."

"Are you suggesting what I think that you're suggesting?" Ginny had recovered enough to join the conversation, but there was an almost awe-struck quality to her voice when she spoke.

"If you think that I'm suggesting that Umbridge was a hack, and we're dealing with the real thing now so we need to step things up a notch, then yes."

The memory faded out to be replaced by an image of Luna squatting in a dark alcove peering at something laying in her palm. It took a minute for Sadie's eyes to adjust to the darkness. When they did, she realized the something in Luna's hand was in fact a gold galleon – a DA coin. It was night, and the hallway appeared to be deserted. Sadie looked around trying to determine what it was that Luna was doing. That she was waiting for something appeared to be the only logical answer. The question was for what was she waiting? And why did it require her to hide in the dark? Footsteps began to echo down the hallway, and Sadie and Luna both turned their heads to watch. A sloped shouldered figure was making its way toward them with wand tip lit. As it got closer, Sadie recognized that the figure was a woman who seemed to be muttering to herself as she walked.

"High and mighty, that one. Ordering me about like I'm a regular old teacher. He himself put me in my place here. Reckon that makes me a step up o'er the others. Night patrols indeed. Shouldn't have to. Let the others do it. Ickle twits are too scared to be out of their beds, anyway."

As the figure shuffled further down the hall, Luna touched her wand to the galleon in her hand. Sadie watched in the slight glow from Luna's wand as the words around the edge shifted to read "Heading toward Ginny."

Luna continued to stand very still in her spot for what seemed to be an exceedingly long time. Finally, something made her look down at the coin in her hand, and she relit her wand tip. "We're done. She's in the charms' corridor" the coin now read. Luna nodded as if the words had been spoken aloud, and she was acknowledging her comprehension. She stepped out from behind the statue and began to make her was toward Ravenclaw tower.

The next memory opened in what Sadie recognized as Moaning Myrtle's bathroom. Luna and Ginny were seated on the floor against the far wall talking in low voices.

"It isn't Neville's fault, did you tell him that?" Luna was saying. Her voice, despite the almost whispered volume, managed to convey a hefty amount of concern.

"I tried, but he isn't really listening to me." Ginny replied sounding almost desperate. "I'm afraid he's going to go and do something stupid."

"Like get caught sneaking priceless artifacts out of the Headmaster's office?" Luna inquired with a small grin. (Who knew Luna had had a sense of humor? No one Sadie had ever talked to on the subject had ever given any such indication. Few people had probably known her well enough to notice Sadie found herself thinking.)

"He thinks he shouldn't have gotten us involved in all this." Ginny said rolling her eyes at what she obviously thought was Neville's obtuseness.

"We all involved ourselves," Luna stated. "He knows that. He's just feeling responsible for everyone."

"Talk to him for me?" Ginny asked a note of pleading in her voice. "Pretend you're asking for Herbology help or something. I'm worried about him. He's doing too much. He's going to get caught."

Luna merely nodded and stood up readying to go. She stopped when she reached the doorway and looked back at Ginny who was still sitting on the floor. "You know," she began. "He said the exact same thing and asked me to talk to you." Luna gave her a smile and started to open the door.

"Luna?" Ginny's voice made her pause and turn back around.

"Yes, Ginny?"

"We both said the same thing about you as well." Ginny was shaking her head at the apparent absurdity of the situation.

Luna shrugged her shoulders. "I guess we'll all have to be careful then because we're not going to stop."

"No," Ginny said her voice sounding more sure as she stood. "We're not."

The memory ended, and Sadie let herself sit in front of what she realized was still a blank wall. She really had to do something about that. It was all wrong. Everything that she had thought about Neville (funny how he had changed from being Professor Longbottom in her thoughts into simply being Neville) during her school years was wrong. It had to be. The boy in these memories wasn't some sit on the sidelines and talk instead of do ninny like they all had thought.

Why had they all thought that? Was it because he had been so ready to talk about things that the other adults around them had never been willing to mention? That made no sense. Hadn't they always complained that no one would talk to them? Why had they laughed behind Neville's back when he actually gave them what they said they wanted to hear? Had they thought that he was making a lot of it up? Yes, they had that. It had all seemed such utter nonsense. How could sweet but klutzy and utterly plant life obsessed Professor Longbottom have led the student defenders of Hogwarts? Let alone gotten himself close enough to Voldemort to kill the giant snake they had all heard so much about?

They had misjudged him because he didn't fit into their idea of what the hero was supposed to be like. She and all of her friends had been exactly like the kids at Hogwarts who had never given Luna Lovegood a chance. They had never bothered to look past the surface to see who he was underneath. It was humbling to realize that. All that righteous indignation she had felt toward Luna's memories of her schoolmates should have been turned against herself.

Another thought struck her and Sadie rushed to look back at how she had originally phrased her question to Luna. It was practically dripping with disdain. Why had Luna even bothered answering her? She, herself, would have been insulted at being asked questions framed in such a manner. She was no longer surprised that Luna had taken longer than usual to answer her. She was surprised that Luna had bothered with answering her at all. Why had she been listening to Constance? It was obvious that it was her tone of voice that was creeping into her questions. She meant well and all (Didn't she?), but she was rather accusing in the way she talked about things. She was also wrong about so many things. The DA hadn't been a joke. They hadn't been children playing a game. They hadn't been Harry Potter's puppets. The Weasleys she had seen in these memories hadn't been conniving individuals worried about nothing but improving the family fortunes. Luna was not crazy. Hermione was not a "nasty piece of work." What had Constance grown up hearing from her parents? Why did they seem to be so bitter about everything and everyone? There had to be something more going on there. First things first, however, she needed to send off an apology to Luna. She seemed to be doing that quite often of late.

Two hours later, Sadie found herself still staring at a mostly blank parchment. Why was this so hard? She was a writer, was she not? It hadn't been this hard to come up with apologies for Adrienne or Dray. What was so different about Luna? She realized with a start that she couldn't explain to Luna why she had been feeling so accusing when she wrote that question. That would mean going into Constance's commentary. She also couldn't explain what it was that had knocked her back into her senses. That would mean explaining about the memories that Luna didn't know she was seeing. This would have been so much simpler if Luna had just asked questions at the start. Wait, it wasn't fair to blame Luna for this. It was her responsibility as a writer to have handled making the explanations. If it weren't for Constance's interference . . . That wasn't fair either. Constance had hardly forced her to agree. It was her own fault. The simple fact of the matter was that she had been scared after the initial reaction from the Potters and Weasleys that no one was going to participate in her project. Hers. The one that was going to revitalize the world of historical magical education. The one that was going to make her name on a level with Bathilda Bagshot when people discussed great magical historians. The project that was going to answer all the questions that she and her friends had never had the answers to about what had really happened. Deep down she had been relieved when Constance told her not to push the issue with Luna, and she had run with it. She had no one to blame but herself. And all those little asides that Constance had been feeding her? She had been willing to listen to her. Why? She wasn't really sure. Maybe she had been excited about finding pieces of the story that no one had ever told before? Maybe she had been miffed at them all for turning her down? (Oh no, maybe she was becoming Rita Skeeter.) Maybe because so much of what she did know made no sense, and she was grasping at any scrap of information that might bring some clarity? There were so many things that none of them had ever understood. Why had Adrienne's father gone off to the United States and never come back, but insisted that Adrienne attend Hogwarts? Why had her own father attended Beauxbatons when Colin was at Hogwarts? Why hadn't Colin gone there when the culling of the muggle borns started under Voldemort? Why did Drake's father (normally the most even-tempered of men) always yell at them when they were making fun of Professor Longbottom's war stories but refuse to tell them his own? There had been so many questions for so long. And the only answers they had ever gotten had been ones that they didn't really believe.

The only line written on Sadie's parchment suddenly attracted her attention – 29 January 2038. Three days until her draft of Luna's sixth year was due. Remembering Luna's initial answers to her owls, Sadie decided that simple was best and composed a letter the body of which contained only two words – "I'm sorry." There weren't really any explanations to give. The questions were badly done, and she couldn't take them back. She could only be better from now forward. She sent the letter off with the small, gray owl that had responded to her summons and broke the seal on the next parchment.

**What was Hogwarts like under Snape and the Carrows?**

_I think that what you have asked is actually two questions with somewhat different answers. The Carrows were school hallway bullies who never cottoned on to the fact that they weren't nearly as important as they thought they were. They did not strike me as the brightest of individuals, and they never displayed an abundance of talent (unless the frightening of 11 year olds or the ability to speak and hit something simultaneously have recently been designated as talents). If you ask me (which no one ever has before), they were sent to Hogwarts to keep them from messing up any important projects on the outside. Do not mistake my meaning. They injured a fair number of students during their tenure, but they were both incapable of accomplishing what anyone who thought through the subject logically would have to conclude was the point of seizing control of a school. It was unpleasant, and it was somewhat hazardous to your physical well-being. All in all, however, we were still at the school because who we were was still valued enough to provide us with a certain measure of safety. We were being given time to come around._

_We did not often see Professor Snape around the school. We were often so focused on combating whatever new rubbish the Carrows were spreading around that we forgot about his presence. When we did think about it, we supposed that he was overseeing things from his stolen office, formulating ways to convert all of us to the mind set of the Death Eaters. We only knew that he was failing miserably at that task. I only saw him up close on one occasion that year – the time that we (Ginny, Neville, and I) broke into the Headmaster's office to steal the sword of Godric Gryffindor. He was then not much different in manner than he had been in his classes._

_What you need to understand, I think, is that Hogwarts is comprised of the people within her. It doesn't matter so much what Hogwarts was under the leadership of that year. What matters is who the people within her walls became as they encountered it. All stories are about the choices that we make, dear. Circumstances and obstacles and changes in the world may provide a backdrop, but the story is always written by the choices that the individuals involved made. Hogwarts was then what it had always been before and what it will always be in the years to come – exactly what her inhabitants make her. For those of us who made the choice to resurrect the DA, Hogwarts was a proving ground. It was a daily example of the lies our world was being fed. It was our opportunity to stop them from spreading. It was our hope that whether the war was won or not, Voldemort could never truly win – because in order to do that he would have to break those of us who knew the truth. That year at Hogwarts was our place to find out that truth cannot be broken. It was our place to learn that we could not be broken either._

The first memory opened in a classroom whose decorations (or lack thereof) gave Sadie no indication of what subject was being taught. It was very austere. While the decorating of classrooms at Hogwarts was never ostentatious, you could usually garner some information about the professor by what he or she chose to display. There was nothing on display in this room. There were no books, no words upon the board, even the desks had been stowed against the wall to create a large, empty space in the middle of the room. The teacher's desk was in its proper location, but it was devoid of any object. Papers, reference books, materials for the lesson – there were none. The walls were bare, and the windows were shuttered. The bookshelves were empty, and the cabinet doors hung open displaying equally empty shelves. It felt wrong – as if you had stumbled into the school during a cleaning session in the summer holidays and should leave at once. Only the standing, huddled students gave any indication that an actual lesson was about to commence. However, there was something very wrong with them as well. They were silent. Despite the lack of adult supervision, there were no exchanges between the students. One side of the room was crowded with Ravenclaws, Hufflepuffs, and Gryffindors. The Slytherins stood together on the opposite side. Most of them were attempting to look nonchalant about the situation, but you could read it in their features that they also were nervous. They all seemed to be waiting for something, and if the demeanor of the room were any indication, that something was not going to be good.

It was so unnaturally quiet, that Sadie actually heard the door swing open on its hinges. She hadn't realized that the classroom doors at Hogwarts actually made noise – her years of schooling had never had a moment of such intense quiet in them. The person who must be the anxiously awaited professor entered, and one thought flowed through Sadie's brain – minion. She had thought that only her grandparents' muggle movies had such typecasting, but apparently it could occur in real life as well. The man standing in front of the children looked destined from birth to be a sycophantic follower. "Toady," her grandmother had always called them when watching her American, depression era gangster movies. The description definitely applied here. She found herself wondering if people were actually born with that persona, or if it came after years of choosing to follow. This had to be Amycus Carrow. Suddenly, Luna's description of school hall bully made perfect sense, and Sadie found herself wondering if Luna wasn't correct in her assumptions about why the Carrows had been placed at Hogwarts in the first place. Surely, no sensible person would entrust anything of importance to someone whose very presence sent out an aura of incapability of independent thought. But had Voldemort ever actually wanted followers who thought independently? Wouldn't that have caused his half-blood self problems? Sadie thought back to Charity Burbage – thinking on the part of his followers had probably been one of Voldemort's biggest liabilities.

The man (Sadie couldn't, even only in her head grant him the title of professor) pulled a list from his pocket and read off three names. Ginny Weasley marched resolutely to the center of the room and stood tossing her hair back over her shoulder. She crossed her arms and stared Carrow in the eyes which seemed to make him angry. Angry enough, that he momentarily didn't notice that the other two students named hadn't come forward.

"Think you're special, doncha?" The man taunted in a voice more becoming a small child on a playground than a grown man in a position of authority. "Blood traitor trash. That's what chu are. We'll see how high and mighty chu are after lessons, we will."

Ginny continued to stare for a moment before opening her mouth to say something in response. Luna, who was standing unobtrusively off to the side, caught her eye and shook her head very slightly. Ginny rolled her eyes but closed her mouth and continued to stare. The expression on Carrow's face lost its angry expression which was replaced with something that made him looked very pleased with himself. There was a glint in his eyes that Sadie would only be able to call feral.

"Lovegood!" The man bellowed. He turned to find her in her spot and looked at her expectantly. Luna didn't move. Her eyes had moved from Ginny and were dreamily fixed on the ceiling above her as if she were unconcerned by the proceedings. "I said, Lovegood!" Carrow yelled again.

Luna's eyes flicked downwards to rest on the man's face, and she raised one eyebrow in an expression of mild curiosity. Whether it was the fact that Luna hadn't responded verbally or that he had expected her to jump to the center of the room, Sadie didn't know, but the response Luna was giving was clearly not the one that the man intended to receive. He suddenly lunged forward and grabbed a hunk of Luna's long hair. He yanked on it pulling Luna into the room's cleared center space. Just as suddenly he yelped and let go of Luna his hands flying backwards to cover his rear. Sadie caught sight of movement from Ginny's direction in the corner of her eye and turned just in time to see her wand sliding back up her sleeve. Carrow's reflexes weren't as good. By the time he managed to spin himself around, the only sight to be seen was Ginny standing with her arms crossed still glaring in his direction. "Think stinging hexes are cute? We'll see how cute you are when you're writhing on the floor. Lovegood, Cruciatis, now."

Luna was staring at the ceiling again and her voice when she responded seemed to come from far away. "Blue would be nice, don't you think?"

"I prefer red." It was Ginny's voice.

Carrow's head was jerking between the two so quickly that Sadie thought it might pop off at any moment (not that that would necessarily be a bad thing). "Lovegood, I gave you an order!" Wasn't the man capable of speaking in a tone of voice that didn't need a variation of the word _yell_ as a descriptor?

Luna continued as if she hadn't heard. "Perhaps purple then?"

A Hufflepuff girl actually giggled before almost eating her fist in an effort to contain the sound. She needn't have worried – Carrow was too focused on the blond and red-head in front of him to pay her any mind.

"Are you refusing an order, Lovegood? Trying to make me look bad in front of the class? Huh?" Again he was bellowing.

Ginny actually snorted before muttering "Like you need the help." Snickers could be heard coming from the group of Gryffindors. The longer Ginny and Luna kept up their passive aggressive routine; the more the tension in the room seemed to ease. Carrow had obviously had enough, and he shoved Luna so that she and Ginny were standing side by side.

"Looks like you're joining the detention group." It apparently occurred to him then that the rest of the "detention group" had never stepped forward. He grabbed a Hufflepuff girl whose house mates seemed to have been attempting to shield her from view during the Ginny/Luna interchange and pulled her to stand next to the other girls. The other student called had been a Slytherin. His house mates weren't displaying the same level of loyalty as the Hufflepuffs had. Carrow didn't have to make a grab for him – the students on either side shoved him to the center. It made for an interesting quartet. The Slytherin boy stood trying to appear unconcerned by the whole situation, but not succeeding nearly as well as Luna who was once again staring at the ceiling as if there were a code etched and waiting to be deciphered there. Ginny was looking as if the whole ordeal was boring her out of her mind, and the Hufflepuff girl was hugging herself and sniffling. Carrow decided that this would be a good time to deliver a lecture about the importance of punishment for those who disobeyed authority. Sadie wasn't listening however. She was too busy watching the change that was slowly taking place in the stance of the Hufflepuff girl. She had been looking back and forth between Ginny and Luna during the whole of Carrow's long-winded blathering. Clearly, the man enjoyed dwelling on the particulars of the pain that he had the power to inflict. Sadie didn't think that the girl was listening. She glanced a few times over at the house mates who had been shielding her from view, and she even looked once over at the Slytherins who had been so willing to put their housemate forward. The sniffles died away, and the expression on her face became contemplative instead of apprehensive. Her shoulders straightened, her head came up, and she crossed her arms in a posture that was copying Ginny. Her eyes focused on Carrow as the man finished his spiel – he hadn't noticed the change that his time consumption had allowed to take place. As he called a beady-eyed boy forward, the memory faded out.

Sadie wasn't sure whether to be happy about that or not. They used the Cruciatus curse in place of detention? Hadn't Luna described the Carrows' tenure as "somewhat dangerous?" That wasn't somewhat dangerous. That was . . . She was at a loss for words, and a sick feeling crept into the pit of her stomach as she realized the implications of what she had just seen. Luna had made it sound like the students didn't really have it that badly. Hadn't she? Or had she just meant that there were other people who had it worse? What was worse than being tortured by your teachers? Or, apparently, your classmates? Azkaban? That would have been back when it was guarded by those things that made you feel sad. Surely, that would have been a picnic by comparison. She wanted to know if the boy Carrow had called on had gone through with it. You had to really mean the dark arts to make them work, isn't that what they always said? Sixteen year olds wouldn't really have been able to do that, would they? The sick feeling in the pit of her stomach wasn't getting any better. What if they had? She thought of the ease with which the Slytherin students had been prepared to turn one of their own over. What if they had all turned on each other? Luna had implied the obvious use of taking over a school being to convert the young to Voldemort's ideology, but what if that wasn't the point? What if the point was to bring out the worst in all of the students? What if the point was to make the students so used to looking toward their own self preservation that they wouldn't think twice about selling anyone else out in order to do it? What if that was what Voldemort wanted? Would he even need to turn them into believers if he could rule them through fear and the removal of anyone in their lives that they could truly trust?

"You disappoint me, Longbottom." A voice was saying, and Sadie realized with a start that the second memory had begun to play. Luna, Ginny, and Neville stood shoulder to shoulder in front of the desk in what Sadie recognized as the headmaster's office. A sword lay across the desk – rubies glittering in its hilt. The man speaking must be Severus Snape. His voice was laden with disdain and a touch of what might have been resigned tiredness. "I had cherished a hope that your ineptness was confined to the brewing of potions and your inability to walk without falling. I see now that you are even more pathetic than I had previously believed. Pity. Did the three of you honestly believe that you could run rampant in the halls in the middle of the night and not be noticed? Did you give no thought to the fact that the headmaster's office would be charmed to give notice of intruders? Or are all three of you incapable of intelligent thought? It will take much more than the unplanned, uncoordinated, dim-wittedly pathetic endeavors of a trio of unqualified students to interfere with the order in this school."

Sadie hadn't noticed Carrow standing in the background until he spoke. "Thieving. We'll be sure to get the point across." He gestured to the woman standing next to him – obviously his sister. "There won't be any more thieving after we get through wit em."

Snape made a dismissing gesture with his hand as he began to speak. "There will be no need for that Carrow. I'll be handling their punishment." The woman started to protest, but Snape cut her off with a look that would have frozen water in a desert. "These students have declared a predilection for entering places that are forbidden. I shall be indulging their taste. They may serve time in the Forbidden Forest assisting Hagrid with his duties." This clearly placated the Carrows because they both grinned (which was in itself not a pleasant sight). It was also odd, Sadie thought, because she was almost positive that she had seen a flicker of relief pass across the faces of both Ginny and Neville.

Sadie was confused. She had witnessed what Amycus Carrow believed to be an appropriate detention punishment. Stealing from the headmaster's office must rank higher than trouble in the hallways, so he and his sister must believe that going into the Forest was worse. Ginny and Neville must not share their opinion. Was Snape protecting them then? What had that lecture on unplanned, pathetic endeavors been about? Had he been warning them that they needed to watch their steps? Why had the three of them even wanted to steal the sword anyway? If Neville's stories were true (and Sadie was beginning to believe that they were), he would eventually use that sword to kill the giant snake. But he couldn't know that yet, could he? And why would they need to steal it? Wasn't it just supposed to appear to "worthy Gryffindors" in their time of need, or something like that?

The next memory took place in a room that hadn't yet made an appearance in Luna's memories. It was one that Sadie knew quite well – she had spent seven years inhabiting it. It was the Ravenclaw common room. Luna was sitting near the statue of Rowena Ravenclaw. A boy that seemed familiar to Sadie was seated next to her with another girl seated on the other side of him. This new girl looked nearly panicked. As Sadie watched, she hopped up from her chair and with a parting "It's not your fight" she rushed toward the dormitories. The boy sighed and turned to look at Luna. It finally clicked in Sadie's head that this boy was actually Drake's dad. He looked so young.

"It's not that Mandy doesn't care," he was saying in a pleading tone of voice to Luna. "It's just that it hasn't really hit her yet what's happening."

Luna didn't respond to his statement. Instead she appeared to be distracted by something and shoved her hand into her pocket. She pulled out the DA coin and read the message printed on it. Drake's dad had pulled out one as well. "We aren't pretending that we can't get caught." Luna was saying, "We will all understand if . . ." She was cut off in mid sentence.

"I'm not quitting. It _is_ my fight. There's not going to be any middle ground, and I'm not going to pretend that there is. Fence sitting is a luxury that no one is going to have much longer. They'll all realize that soon. Mandy will come around, and if she doesn't . . . She'll come around."

The memory faded, and Sadie found that there were dozens of questions floating around in her brain. Luna had stressed that the important part of that year at Hogwarts hadn't been the outside influences at all – it had been how they all reacted to it. Why would her mind pull up these particular memories in response to that question? The encounter with Snape made perfect sense. But why that given day of detention with Carrow? It couldn't be because of the way she and Ginny had resisted, or the memory would have ended earlier. Was the real reason Luna thought of that moment because of the way the Hufflepuff girl had lost her fear of the situation? Her house mates had tried to shield her. Ginny and Luna had demonstrated courage under fire. She had obviously been disgusted by the Slytherin's lack of loyalty for their own. Had that girl made a choice then that Carrow was nothing to fear because he couldn't break through the things that really mattered – friendship, their sense of right and wrong, etc? Had the DA gained a convert that day? Was that why Luna remembered that moment? Then, there was the scene with Drake's dad. Why had Luna remembered that conversation? The fact that he could have walked away, caved to pressure to stay out of it and mind his own business, and he didn't. Or was it about the girl? How could anyone have seen what was going on at Hogwarts and think that it was okay to pretend that is wasn't her problem? Sadie almost choked when the gravity of what she had just thought in contrast with her previous thoughts about the DA (not to mention the phrasing of her original question to Luna on that subject) occurred to her. That was what she had thought, wasn't it? That they were just kids who probably should have let the adults handle everything. But, she thought in her own defense, that was before she had actually seen what was happening. That girl had lived it. But was it fair of Sadie to hold those thoughts she was expressing against that girl when she had thought the same things herself? She was suddenly curious about who that girl was. Mandy. Sadie hadn't seen her in any of the memories of Luna's classes, so she was probably not in Luna's year. Drake's dad hadn't been in Luna's year either. He was a year older – in Harry Potter's class. This Mandy girl looked to be about the same age. She and Drake's dad seemed . . . close. It was nothing overt. Just a certain something in their posture and the emotion of the conversation that seemed to imply that their relationship wasn't casual. What had happened to her? Had she come around as Terry had hoped? Or had she tried to continue "fence sitting" as he had called it? And out of all the people that Luna must have talked to over that year why had that been the one she had called to mind? Well, at least she should be able to find an answer to a few of those questions. It was time to owl Adrienne again.

30 January 2008

Adrienne,

Could you find out what you can about a Ravenclaw named Mandy who would have been in the 1998 graduating year?

Thank you much,

Sadie

With her deadline luming, Sadie decided to wait to open her last parchment from Luna. She had enough information for a rough draft on that year at Hogwarts, and that question about Neville was probably more personal curiosity than professional source material anyway. Just like whatever it was that had Adrienne so excited about the DA list, it could wait until later.


	6. Interruption

Chapter 5 – Interruption

1 February 2038

Sade,

You're doing a great job. I don't care if the powers that be like it or not. You just remember that you are telling something beautiful that needs to be told. Now that you aren't struggling to finish chapters on time, have you looked at the DA list?

Adrienne

1 February 2038

Adrienne,

Thanks. Mr. Hopkirk is supposed to get back to me later today. Constance demanded copies as well. I am quite sure she will make her opinion known with due haste. What happened to letting the DA topic lay? I am cleaning off my desk while I wait to hear back, and I am sure I will find my copy somewhere in this snowstorm of parchment. You would not happen to have found the answers to any more of my questions, would you?

Sadie

1 February 2038

Sade,

Charity Burbage was the Muggle Studies teacher at Hogwarts for six years. The _Prophet_ reported her resignation from that post in July of 1997. She had just had an article printed about the need of the magical world to be accepting of the muggle world as a whole and the importance of "new blood" being brought into the old families. From the tone, I suspect she had a thorough background in the health problems that occurred in Europe's royal families during their limited marriage option years. She disappeared that summer. After the war, when the memorial was in its planning stages, Draco Malfoy came forward with details. His statement says that she did not, in fact, resign from Hogwarts. Rather, she had been abducted by Death Eaters. He said that Voldemort killed her himself. I guess that article made her a threat to the power structure he was building.

I don't even know where to begin when it comes to Dolores Umbridge. She was at Hogwarts for one year - during which time she was the Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher, Hogwarts High Inquisitor, and the ministry appointed headmaster. The _Prophet_ from that year is chalk full of all these crazy decrees designed to give her complete control over the school. Hogwarts is really supposed to operate as an independent institution; I don't know how Cornelius Fudge got away with half the things they did that year. I've attached a summary list of all the decrees. After Albus Dumbledore was reinstated as headmaster, she retained her original position with the MOM. During Pious Thicknesse's tenure as minister, she became the Chair of the Muggle Born Registration Committee. Basically, that means she held show trials convicting all muggle borns of "stealing" magic and had them carted off to Azkaban. She ended up incarcerated there herself when everything was said and done.

Would it be a Lavendar Brown for whom you were looking? Lavendar can't have been that common of a first name. She's on the injured list from the Battle of Hogwarts. I've got a marriage record for her and a Seamus Finnigan, and they have two daughters.

There's a Mandy Brocklehurst who is the proper age, but there won't be any later information to find. She's on the casualty list from the Battle of Hogwarts.

Adrienne

Sadie had fully intended to sort the parchment on her desk into properly organized piles, as well as figuring out whatever it was that had Adrienne so concerned about the DA list. (She was acting incredibly strange.) Before she could get that far, however, she was interrupted by a sudden influx of owls from work.

1 February 2038

Sadie,

I am very disappointed, dear. After all we had talked about, I had hoped that you would dig a little deeper with these installments. I do realize that you have been under a level of deadline pressure to which you are not yet used – which is why I had hoped you would allow me to assist you. You are obviously swamped. You need help. Let me conduct interviews for you, and then you can concentrate on wielding that talented little quill of yours. It will make your life ever so much easier.

Don't fret. These are only rough drafts, and there is still plenty of time in which to fix them. You have a wealth of wonderful information here; you just need a little guidance as to how to properly present it. Be in my office at nine tomorrow morning, and I will point out the places which you need to flesh out and find a little more dirt.

Looking forward to it,

Constance

1 February 2038

Dear Miss Creevey,

I must say that I enjoyed the rough drafts of your new chapters immensely. They are, of course, rough drafts and need some editorial attention, but all in all I think you are on to something simply spendid here. You have quite the flair for making your characters engaging on a personal level, and readers eat that up. Well done.

I should like to see the revised copies on my desk in two weeks time. At that point, I would also like rough drafts for two new chapters and to hear that you have gained cooperation from at least one more DA member.

It is the 40th anniversary this year – as I am sure you are aware. It would be much to our advantage if the first installment of this project was ready for release on the anniversary date itself.

Sincerely,

Winston Hopkirk

President, W. W. Publishing

1 February 2038

Sadie,

It would be most helpful at our little meeting in the morning were you to bring along your source material. A fresh pair of eyes is always a wonderful way to spot potential important aspects of a story that your inexperienced ones might have missed.

Constance

1 February 2038

Dear Miss Creevey,

Please excuse the liberty, but I just had to tell you. I snagged a copy of your work that was being passed around the offices. It was lovely, dear. I noticed that Ms. Smith seems to be sending quite a few owls your way lately, and we all know how she can be. I just thought you might need a few words of encouragement.

Yours truly,

Abigail Weldon

Interdepartmental Communications, W. W. Publishing

1 February 2038

Sadie,

Darling, I've had the most brilliant idea. You are going to come with me to tea with my mother and father tomorrow afternoon. We'll get together in the morning just like we planned and head over there after we've gotten some work done. This is just what you need to help you shake off that Harry Potter worship infection you've been exposed to of late. I know you tried very hard to be impartial, dear, but you are new at this. Luna's enthusiasm for her ex was bound to start rubbing off on you. After you've been doing this for a few years, you will learn to keep a little more distance between yourself and your subjects.

Until tomorrow,

Constance

1 February 2038

Dear Miss Creevey,

Constance has just told me that you and she are working on the potential general public release version of your work. Good girl. I am glad to see you stepping up and taking the initiative in this matter. I look forward to seeing the result of your labors.

Sincerely,

Winston Hopkirk

President, W. W. Publishing

1 February 2038

Sadie,

Awful news, dear. I am afraid I will have to cancel our appointment. Apparently, there has been some sort of problem in the Belgian office. Normally, Natalie would take care of things like this, but she, unfortunately, has not yet returned from that debacle at the American offices. I am sorry; we will have to reschedule when I return. Such are the perils of being senior staff. I would be thrilled if you stepped up and used this time to do a little digging on your own. Have something to surprise me with when I return from my trip.

Constance

Sadie was positive that her neighbors had heard her sigh of relief when she finished Constance's last letter. She had had no idea how she was going to get herself out of working toward Constance's vision for her project. Although, tea with her parents might have proved interesting. There was something very odd about their version of their time at Hogwarts. Anyway, she still had no idea how she was going to deal with Constance, but at least she had a little time to figure it out now. The next owl tapping at Sadie's window was much more welcome. It was from Luna.


	7. Upheaval

**Chapter 6 – Upheaval**

Sadie settled herself into her armchair attempting to mentally prepare herself for what she was about to see. This parchment was, after all, about the Battle of Hogwarts. These were not going to be happy childhood memories or even unpleasant school year remembrances. This was an actual battle. It was hard to convince yourself of what that really meant. People had been hurt and killed, and Sadie was about to have a front row seat. It was different she decided than just reading about some faceless persons (or in her case what had always been a vague notion of a family member she had never known).

As powerful and expressive as words could be, there were some things that Sadie knew just couldn't be conveyed in such a medium. This was going to be beyond that. This was going to be seeing it. It was going to be really seeing it from the perspective of someone who had actually been there. It was going to be intense and frustrating and painful. Sadie had no illusions about it being easy to watch, but it had to be done. She thought about her father's brother and the potential part he might be playing in what she was about to witness. She would just try to stay away from Colin if he appeared in any of the memories she decided. Part of her wanted to know what had truly happened if it was in there somewhere, but another part of her knew that she wasn't quite ready to see it either. With a deep breath, she opened the seal.

**Tell me about the Battle of Hogwarts.**

_No._

Sadie was so shocked that she stopped the player. That was all there was to the message – no reason, no equivocation. Just no. Should she let the memory play anyway? Luna had never refused to answer a question before. Granted she didn't know about the memory capture either. Sadie cut off that train of thought before she had time to start feeling guilty again. She should see what memory had prompted Luna to refuse. Maybe she was just uncomfortable talking about fighting in the battle. That had to be it. It couldn't be pleasant to relive something like that. Sadie was actually doing her a favor by allowing the story to be told without Luna having to go through the pain of relating it to someone. It really was better this way. Realizing that she was trying to convince herself, Sadie started the memory playing before she had time to talk herself out of it.

The great hall was so full of people that it took Sadie a moment to locate Luna. She was seated at the Ravenclaw table next to a girl of Indian descent with long, dark hair. A boy's voice coming from the direction of the Hufflepuff table was shouting a question about staying to fight. Before Sadie could locate who had spoken, a girl a few seats down from Luna was calling out about having time to gather her possessions. Honestly, Sadie thought to herself looking around at the anxious faces in the room, who thought about stuff at a time like this? Had they not all realized what was happening? Her thoughts were interrupted by a commanding voice that seemed to come from nowhere and everywhere all at once. It was Voldemort she realized feeling a shiver run down her spine. It was Voldemort trying to convince them not to fight – to give him Harry Potter. As if acquiescing to his demands on this occasion would suddenly make everything all right. Sadie watched as three of the houses stood to protect Harry. It was a bizarre sight. Little more than children (most of them clothed in pajamas) stood between Harry and a hysterical girl at the Slytherin table with an almost universal expression of determination on their faces. Sadie almost (almost) felt badly for the poor girl. She had obviously not expected to find herself on the firing end of the wands of 3/4 of the school. Even a few of the Slytherin students around her were looking at her with an expression of distaste on their faces. Although, Sadie wasn't entirely sure if it was due to what she had said or if it was a response to her drawing attention in their direction.

As the evacuation began, no one remained at the Slytherin table. That bothered Sadie for some reason that she couldn't quite determine. She had been told many times that the rivalry between the houses hadn't always been a good-natured competition for points. It had always been hard for her to envision a time when you weren't just better friends with students from your own house because of the quantity of time that you spent with them. You were sorted of course by different qualitites or goals that you held, but that there had been a time that the differences between the houses had been so far reaching that the lines of loyalty had been so clearly drawn as what she was now seeing was difficult to process. Hadn't any of the Slytherin students understood that what was going on was wrong? Hadn't any of them believed that Hogwarts was worth defending? Sadie stopped herself in the middle of that thought. Hadn't there been a time not so very long ago when she was convinced that it was irresponsible for the students to stay behind to fight? How was that any different?

The sound of a voice shouting "Creevey, go!" shook her out of her revery. Her previous determination to avoid him if possible crumbled. Hadn't she always wondered why he had stayed behind when they evacuated the underage? This was her chance to know. She silenced the voice in the back of her head that was telling her that she was nowhere near ready to watch her uncle die. After all, the battle hadn't even started yet. She would just watch him and find out why he hadn't gone. She could do that. She looked around for Colin, but she couldn't spot him in the crowd. She stopped the memory and replayed it from the beginning – guiltily hurrying over Luna's "No." inscribed at the start. Someone had told him to leave. Someone had tried to keep the underage out of what was about to follow. She couldn't decide if that was comforting or not. She rushed over to the Gryffindor table and began scanning faces. She found him seated halfway down the table. His head was close to the girl sitting next to him, and they appeared to be whispering frantically back and forth. As the two of them broke apart to look for the source of Voldemort's voice with everyone else, Sadie found herself staring at the face of the girl in shock. She was the proper age, but Sadie had never bothered to ask her her house affiliation. She had always rather assumed that most people who would have decided to dedicate their lives to book publishing would have been Ravenclaws. She had been wrong on that score. Natalie McDonald had been a Gryffindor. Not only that, she had obviously known Colin. Why hadn't she ever said anything? Why hadn't she told her? The confusion and sense of resentfulness she was feeling toward Nat were short lived however. It was overpowered by a set of stronger emotions.

Sadie had always found stories that used the phrase "the world stopped turning" to be rather overly dramatic, but that would be the phrase she would write at this moment if she were capable of writing (or even of coherent thought). As the students at the table turned to face the shouting Slytherin girl, Sadie caught sight of the boy who had been sitting on the other side of Colin – it was her father. Sadie stared at him in shock – not really believing what her eyes were telling her. It wasn't possible. Her father had gone to Beauxbatons. She had seen the diploma herself. Dennis Creevey should have been in France, but he wasn't. He was there at Hogwarts. He was standing next to his older brother, wand pointed across the great hall, with a glittering DA coin showing between the clutched fingers of his other hand. It couldn't be. He would have told her. He would have said something. He would have . . . but he hadn't. He had been there, and he had never told her. He had let her think that he had been hundreds of kilometers away from everything that had happened when the truth was that he had been right there in the middle of it. It wasn't Colin's DA coin that she had found in the desk all those years ago – it was her father's. He had lied to her.

Still not wanting to believe what she was seeing, Sadie scrambled to her desk and fumbled through the stack of unsorted correspondence still sitting there. After what seemed an eternity, she finally found her copy of Luna's DA list. She frantically ran her eyes down the list barely registering the fact that Luna had gone to the trouble of putting it in alphabetical order for her. Creevey, Colin. Creevey, Dennis. There it was undisputedly written in black and white. Luna wondering why she hadn't just asked her father. Adrienne being so frantic about her actually reading the list. It all made sense now. Except that nothing made sense anymore. Why? Why wouldn't he have told her? Why would he have lied about something as basic as where he went to school? Except he had gone to school at Beauxbatons. She knew he had. He must have transferred later. Why lie? Why not just refuse to talk about it like all the other adults who had been there? And her mother had never corrected her. She had gone along with it all these years. What was so horrible about the truth? All of those cut off conversations when Sadie had thought her dad couldn't bring himself to talk about Colin because he felt guilty for not being there for his brother had really ended because he was feeling guilty about lying. Only he hadn't felt guilty enough, not enough to tell her the truth.

Sadie found herself replaying the memory in the great hall over and over. She lost count of how many times she watched it. Enough times that she completely lost track of where Luna was. Enough times to dimly note her mother – looking frightened and confused at fourteen rushing past her as the hall cleared of students. Enough times that she memorized the looks on all three of their faces as Natalie and Dennis followed a Gryffindor prefect out of the hall leaving Colin sitting at the table. She couldn't follow him – her father. This was Luna's memory, and Luna hadn't gone out the door. Finally, she stopped and sank back in her chair with her arms hugging her knees. Nothing coherent was filtering through her head; not even emotions were registering. She just felt numb.

Sadie wasn't sure how long she sat curled up in her overstuffed armchair trying to process what she now knew. She wasn't even sure what it was that she knew. All she was sure of at the moment was that the numbness was fading, and in its place she was hurt and very, very angry, and she suddenly didn't want to be sitting in her apartment alone anymore.

Drake,

Please. Just come over.

Sadie


	8. Next

Sadie reached for the seal on the parchment trying desperately to rid herself of any thoughts at all. Blank was not in any way shape or form her natural state of being, but she was so tired of thinking. She was tired, and there were no safe thoughts to think. Her anger and disappointment at her father, her painful and very unpleasant argument with Drake, her fretfulness at what was going to happen as soon as Connie returned, her oddly surreal state of 'I can't believe you never said anything' directed towards Nat, her still moderately guilty feelings about keeping Luna in the dark, and her dread at what was going to happen when Adrienne found out that she was about to try to see if the concept of 'burying oneself in work' could literally be done were all swirling around her head by turns and in mass, and she couldn't take it.

She needed to write. Writing was the only thing left in her world that made perfect sense, and she was going to cling to it like a life raft to save her from the ocean of emotional turmoil in which she was enmeshed. She had fired off so many parchments to Luna that the poor woman was probably drowning in them. The piles of letters on her own desk had been read but mostly uncomprehended. She was too much of a mess. She would need to deal with them later, but that would be much later – after she was calm (Sadie scoffed mentally at the thought of her becoming calm anytime soon). She rolled her eyes and gave a semi-indignent huff as she realized just which parchment she had opened. This was just what she needed – lovely memories of an honest, well-adjusted father/daughter relationship to mock her.

**You and your father were separated for much of that last year of conflict. Was it difficult to readjust to your family after having been through such similarly trying but separate experiences?**

_Your question is rather like asking how anyone relates to parents after they have become an adult and have lives that are separate. It was just on a more sudden, somewhat more intense scale. There are things that people go through that can only truly be understood by those who go through them as well. Separation and different experiences can create distance that is more than physical, but the people involved determine whether or not that distance remains. You decide how to incorporate changes and differences, you decide what is important and what can be let go, and you decide how much work to put into keeping those you love close to you._

Luna was standing alone in front of what could only be properly described as the remains of what had once been her home. The circular, tower like building was partially collapsed, and the still erect portions looked fragile, as if a stiff breeze could cause them to go tumbling over. Luna looked stoic, detached. It was as if she wasn't really seeing the image in front of her. The day surrounding the girl didn't seem to fit the mood of the destroyed building at all. The sun was brightly shining, and the sky was so clearly blue that it was almost painful to look at it. Everything from the gentle looking clouds propelled by a soft breeze to the wildflowers popping up in profusion around the yard screamed that it was a beautiful summer day. It was a day made for picnics and chasing butterflies. It wasn't the kind of day that seemed suited for surveying destruction. Luna tilted her upturned face away from the sun whose warmth she had been drinking in (as if it might steady her for what was coming) and slowly opened her eyes to take in the crumbling architecture. She sighed, and her features settled into a determined mask as she took a step forward. Her progress was interrupted by a shout.

"Luna!" The slightly panting form of Neville Longbottom was rushing in her direction. "Wait."

Luna turned and watched the boy hurrying at her with a somewhat confused quirk of her eyebrows. He came to a stop beside her and laid his hand casually on her lower arm while he caught his breath. "Why didn't you tell us?" His voice wasn't demanding or angry as one might expect from the words. Rather, it contained an almost hurt quality.

Luna's head lowered, and her voice came out so softly that it was a wonder that Neville (even as close to her as he was standing) managed to catch the words. "You're all so busy. I can do this on my own."

Neville's eyes closed for a moment (looking for all the world as if he was in pain). His hand slid down her arm so that his fingers intertwined with hers. Luna's head jerked up in surprise. "You could," he stated in a voice pitched low enough to match her own, "but you won't."

"Thank you." She replied smiling while squeezing the fingers still attached to hers.

"That's what friends do for each other." The man replied dropping her hand and suddenly looking uncomfortable. He turned and looked at the remains of the house with wide eyes. "Are you sure it's a good idea to go in there?" He asked her, the discomfort fading from his features as the topic changed.

Luna shrugged nonchalantly. "I need to know what's salvagible. I know it is just stuff, but some stuff is . . ." The girl trailed off while looking at Neville with a pleading expression. He smiled back in response.

"Right then," he stated in a business like tone before trailing into a hint of nervousness. "Is it safe?"

Luna laughed and looked at him with a strange mixture of amusement and complete and utter disbelief. "Safe?" She questioned still laughing.

Neville joined in the laughter, and the bleakness of the ruins seemed to fade into the beauty of the day as the sound echoed around them. Shaking her head, Luna reached over to grab Neville's hand and began tugging him with her as she approached what might have once been a door (or it could have been a window, it was hard to say).

"Come on," she said in a singsong voice, "Mr. Snake-Slaying-Hero of the Battle of Hogwarts, and we shall face the unsafe house together." Luna sounded amused and almost happily childlike, but her words seemed to drain the amusement out of Neville's face. He blushed slightly and something sad appeared at the back of his eyes. Luna didn't see because she was walking in front of him, but she apparently sensed the change in his mood. She stopped and looked at him with a worried expression. "If you really think we shouldn't go in . . ."

Neville cut her off before she could continue. He looked up at her with eyes that were once again sparkling with amusement. "I think we can handle it." This time he was the one tugging her to the opening.

The inside of the house actually looked worse than the outside. The teens worked their way through the building finding very few items that were actually worth the trouble of pulling out from their dusty, crumbling prisons. Luna was wiping off the visible parts of a large printing press trying to see just how broken it really was when her face blanched to a shade of pale that didn't seem possible for a still living person to achieve. She sank back onto her heels clutching a wrinkled, torn paper to her chest and shaking her head in disbelief. She looked at the paper again as if hoping that her eyes were playing tricks on her and tears began to trail down her face as she recognized that they were not.

"Hey, Luna," Neville's voice stopped short when he entered the room and noticed the position is which she was sitting. "What's wrong?" He questioned. She didn't reply. He sank down next to her and shook her shoulder gently. "You're scaring me, Luna." He began. "What is it?"

Luna still didn't speak. She simply held the paper out in Neville's general direction while the silent tears continued to roll down her cheeks. Neville took the paper and squinted down at it as if it might bite him. His eyes widened as they took in the writing and he looked at Luna with an expression that conveyed an emotion Sadie couldn't even begin to try to identify.

"I'm sure he . . ." Neville never finished the sentence. He was cut off as Luna abruptly launched herself at him and began sobbing into his shoulder.

"You were right." Her muffled voice came through. "It wasn't a good idea to come here."

Luna was sitting at a table in what was obviously a tavern in Hogsmeade. No Hogwarts' alumni could mistake the interior of that mainstay of student free days in town. Luna looked like her normal, calm self at first glance, but anyone who was used to her expressions (as Sadie felt she was by now) would recognize that she was unnaturally tense. The man seated across from her didn't look overly at peace with the situation either. As a matter of fact, Harry Potter was looking about as comfortable as a rat facing off with a kneazle. Luna looked at her companion with an almost pitying gaze.

"Why don't you say what you really came here to say, so that you can get back to Ginny?"

Harry choked on his drink. "That's not . . . I . . . Ginny . . . you . . ."

"Harry." She said in a commanding tone. The boy who lived straightened up in his chair and met Luna's gaze.

"I do want to see Ginny." He admitted, "but this is important. You're important."

Luna smiled at him before something glassy settled across her eyes. "You talked to Neville, didn't you?"

Harry nodded. "You need to talk to your dad."

Luna shook her head in the negative direction.

"Please," Harry pleaded, "this is why I didn't tell you. You didn't need to know. It wasn't important."

Luna shook her head again. "It's important to me, Harry. You're important to me. My friends are important to me. You didn't tell me because you don't blame him. You're very forgiving. It's part of why you're you. This isn't about that. He didn't just betray you. He betrayed me as well. He betrayed what I believed. He betrayed why I went through all I did."

"He had his reasons, Luna. Just hear him out."

"I can't yet."

"Luna," he began before he sighed and something dark crossed his features. His sentence died out and he suddenly changed tracks. "Be careful how long you stay angry at someone for doing something you don't understand. Sometimes it's too late to take it back." His hands had tensed and were gripping his bottle far too tightly. Luna reached a reassuring hand across the table and laid it on one of his. The tension eased, and he looked up with a slightly embarrassed expression into Luna's wide, understanding eyes.

"I know."

Luna was pulling a door closed behind her in a hallway decorated with many similar doors. She leaned back against the frame and closed her eyes as her shoulders dropped with something that looked like emotional exhaustion. Her reverie was interrupted by the only other occupant of the hallway.

"Are the two of you okay?" The voice was hesitant but determined, and Neville looked for all the world as if he had no idea what kind of response to expect to his question while trying to be ready for anything from tears to yelling to laughter.

Luna's shoulders shifted as she took a deep breath, opened her eyes, and gave Neville a half smile. "No," she replied in that brutally honest tone that was pure Luna, "but we'll get there."

Some of the tension and worry drained from Neville's frame only to be replaced by an expression of doubt. "I shouldn't have . . ." He stopped at the shake of Luna's head. Her smile widened.

"Thank you." She said.

"You're welcome?" Neville asked uncertainly in an echo of a previous conversation.

"For pushing me," Luna responded. "For being my real friend and telling me what I needed to hear instead of what I wanted to hear." The young woman's posture shifted, and her demeanor returned to what Sadie would have classed as 'normal' Luna. "It's your turn," she told him taking his hand and heading to the staircase.

The two walked in silence until Neville halted them outside the entrance to the permanent care ward. "It goes both ways." He said suddenly. Luna merely quirked her eyebrow in response. "Being grateful," he clarified. "Appreciating having people to . . ." he trailed off his voice sounding as if it were trying to escape from a throat that was too thick to be used.

Luna nodded to show that she understood, and Neville reached out to open the door. "Come with me?" He asked.

Luna smiled at him, and they walked through the doorway together.

Luna never ceased to surprise her. She had managed to answer a question about her father without actually having any memories that included her father.

In an attempt to not let her brain tie that last conversation about friendship to her own still too recent altercation with Drake (plus she really did need the information for her source material), Sadie played the memory back to see what was on the paper that had set Luna off in the first place. She almost wished the words had somehow remained invisible.

What was she going to do now? She couldn't let Constance get hold of this. Could she?


	9. Then

Chapter 8

Suggestions for a Chapter Name Welcome ;)

Trying to maintain numbness was difficult. Pretending you weren't an emotional wreck so that you could keep working without dealing with the things that were making you an emotional wreck was exhausting. She had to keep working. She had deadlines. She had responsibilities. Not working would only mean that she had to think about being lied . . . No! She wasn't going to think. She was going to work. She needed chapters. She needed to edit. She needed to find more subjects. She needed to figure out how in the world she was going to write about Luna's father without letting anyone (especially Constance) find out about the never published edition of the _Quibbler_.

Sadie shuffled through the stack of letters on her desk trying to find one that she could respond to without unsettling the fragile grasp she had on her emotions. Constance? No way. Natalie? Not yet. Her father? No freaking way. Drake? Too hard right now. She wasn't ready to swallow her pride yet. Adrienne? She could do something about Adrienne's last.

5 February 2038

Sadie,

Attached is a copy of the original members of the DA with their status and, where appropriate, current contact information. It took me a while, but I only came up with a dead end on one name. Dean Thomas is coming up a blank. I can't find him anywhere. Maybe you should ask Luna if she knows anything?

Adrienne

P.S. I know you don't want to hear it, but you should talk to your dad. At some point, you need to hear what he has to say. It might as well be sooner over later.

Sadie sighed. She didn't want to hear it – mostly because she knew that Adrienne knew what she was talking about. Who would know about being misled by your father more than Adrienne? She shrugged it off and knocked off a quick note to Luna. She didn't realize until she was sending off the owl that she had cast her charm on the parchment. It moust be habit. Oh well, it's not like it was going to hurt anything. She reached for another parchment Luna had returned and broke open the seal. She had to keep working.

**You were taken from school to be used as leverage against your father and spent time in hiding during that year. Please, tell me about your experiences.**

_It was, of course, disconcerting to be taken from my classmates and separated from my father. It was, however, not unexpected. Subtle was not the order of the day, and those of us who had families who were active in their dissent knew that there would be repercussions. I was proud of what my father had been doing. I knew that it needed to continue. _

_You have odd thoughts sometimes when confronted with strange situations. I remember being saddened that my father would have to spend Christmas alone that year. I remember worrying that I was leaving my friends to pick up the slack from my disappearance. I remember wanting to tell them that it was not their fault that I was being taken. We all spent so much time thinking that we might be pushing each other too hard, and I wanted to be sure that they knew that that was not what had happened. I had chosen. My family had chosen. We all knew what we were doing. I wanted to remind them of that, but there wasn't enough time. _

_I was being forcibly detained, but that was mostly the extent of my time in custody. I had been taken because of someone else. Therefore, there was nothing that they wanted to know from me. I had lots of time on my hands. I was mildly frustrated that I was not still working with my friends, but that did not mean that I could not still work for them. It does not matter where you are. There is always something that you can do. _

_My time in hiding was in some ways similar to my time in confinement. I had lots of time, I could not leave, and I needed to find things to accomplish where I was. If nothing else, the whole situation provided ample opportunities for learning more about the people that shared the situation with you. The Weasley's extended family was very gracious, of course, so the being in hiding was naturally more comfortable._

She had just enough time to wonder whether or not Luna had intended that last comment to be humorous before the memories began to play.

Sadie barely spotted Ginny Weasley's tell tale hair disappearing through the train compartment doorway as the memory began to play. It was the school train. That much was obvious. There was snow visible outside the window, so she would guess that it must be Christmas break.

"What if . . ."

"She'll be fine."

"But . . ."

"If she needs us, we'll hear."

"I don't . . ."

"She can take care of herself. Don't smother her."

Sadie focused on the two teens who remained seated as Ginny left them. Neville looked as if he couldn't decide whether to stay worried about Ginny or to start laughing at the way Luna was replying to his sentences before he managed to speak them. He settled for leaning back into the seat and rubbing his forehead with one hand. He looked tired.

"I'm not trying to . . ."

"We know. She just wants a little time to herself before she . . ."

"Has to face her parents and put on a show so that they don't worry?"

Neville smiled as he turned the tables on the stream of thought interruptions. Despite the background of tension, the look in his eyes was almost mischievous – almost as if they were saying "see, I know what you're thinking as well."

Luna didn't seem to mind. She just smiled back and nodded. The two sat quietly for a few moments. If it hadn't been for the unnatural level of quiet in the background of the train, it might have been a normal school ride just like the ones Sadie had experienced with her friends. That feeling of normalcy was fleeting, and it ended with Neville's next words.

"Do you think it's working?"

His head was down as if he were afraid to see what expressions might cross Luna's face in response to his query. His voice was soft, but it didn't sound unsure so much as it sounded like someone who knew the answer to the question but was desperate for someone else to tell him that he wasn't fooling himself. Luna turned to face him, drawing her knees up onto the seat and leaning her head against her hand while a pensive, faraway (even for Luna) glaze covered her eyes.

"Have you ever been to the beach, Neville?"

The boy's head shot up, and he appeared to be startled. Her eyes remained focused on something beyond Sadie's ability to see.

"My mother and I spent a day playing in the sand once. Sand is strange. You can hold it in your hand, but you can't hold it too tightly. It recognizes that you are trying to force it into a shape that isn't its own, and it escapes from you. You can add water to it to make it cooperate. Then, it will hold whatever shape that you want it to hold. For a time. It doesn't last. The water dries out and the buildings crumble, or the waves wash in and push the sand flat. It goes back to the way it is supposed to be. It might be while you watch. It might be after you leave, but the sand always goes back. It always goes back to the way it should be."

Luna stopped but retained her distant expression. Sadie expected Neville to look confused after listening to Luna's apparent rambling. He didn't look confused. He looked hopeful. He looked as if Luna had answered his question with complete clarity. Which, Sadie realized, she had in her own thoughtful, deep Luna way. A brief shadow flickered across the back of Neville's eyes.

"What if we aren't fixing the beach for ourselves, Luna? What if we are only fixing it for someone who comes later?"

"We do the best we can for them."

Luna's eyes lost their far off quality, and she and Neville stared at each other with an odd mixture of understanding and acceptance. Sadie, once again, felt the uncomfortable twinge of being an intruder flit across the back of her mind.

The moment was destroyed as the train suddenly ground to a halt. Sadie felt a wave of uneasiness. The Hogwart's Express never made unexpected stops. She should have known that something was coming. She knew what question she was watching Luna answer. She had gotten caught up in the exchange between Neville and Luna and gotten lulled by the little cocoon of calm that had been enveloping the two. She felt the gnawing of nervousness in her stomach as the two teens in front of her exchanged a concerned glance. How had they taken Luna? Had they hurt her? Had they hurt Neville? Had Ginny come charging back in at the last moment?

Something about the scene unfolding in front of her felt as if it were vastly important, but she couldn't figure out why. There was nothing violent about the scene as it unraveled in front of her. It was all calm on the surface. The goons who entered even maintained a premise of civility. Quietly asking (in a tone that could not be construed as anything other than an order) for Luna to join them.

There was one tense moment as Neville started to raise the wand that had slipped into his hand automatically at the first sign of something being wrong. It was Luna who stopped him. She said nothing. She merely looked at him with pleading eyes and shook her head ever so slightly. He lowered his arm and nodded in return – giving way to her wishes with a pained look.

The last thing visible from Luna's view as the goons turned and followed her from the compartment (she would walk on her own, thank you very much) was the slumping of Neville's shoulders and the something that shattered behind his eyes as his chin sank into his chest.

Sadie spent a few moment trying to figure out what had gone wrong with the visual on the next memory until she realized that the reason she couldn't see anything was because Luna was in a completely darkened room. There was nothing for her to see except black.

"You are young, dear, and I admire your persistence." The voice was male and older and sounded dreadfully weak. Sadie didn't need to see to know that the man's face would have been blank and empty. His voice conveyed the fact that whatever it was that was going on in this place, he had already given up fighting it.

Luna's voice, in contrast, sounded normal when she spoke. Sadie would have expected at least a hint of fear. It was, after all, creepy to be stuck in utter darkness. Had it been like this the whole time? Sadie felt a shiver run down her spine at the thought of an extended time trapped in a place where you couldn't see. Who knew how long Luna had been here before this memory had occurred?

"However . . ." Luna prompted. Her voice sounded normal but slightly pleased Sadie decided. The man to whom she was speaking wouldn't recognize that trace, but it was there. Sadie wondered how long the teenager had been trying to get the man to talk to her.

"It seems a waste of energy to keep working, to continue enduring in the hopes of something that in all likelihood will not happen."

"Do you have something else on which to spend your time?" Luna asked sounding genuinely curious.

The pause was long, but Luna was patient and didn't try to prompt a further response. When the voice did reply, Sadie wished that his face had been visible. It would have been nice, she thought, to see the expectation, the hope, the life creep back across the man's face. It was clear that that was what was happening, and Sadie found herself shaking her head in wonder at what a dose of Luna could do under the proper circumstances. The accompanying cough still conveyed the man's physical weakness, but the tone was stronger. It was even, amused, and contained a hint of wonder.

"You are correct," he told her. "I don't."

The sunlight diffused through the new scene made Sadie blink her eyes in response. It was difficult to adjust from the pitch blackness of before. It must have been awful on Luna's eyes when she first got out.

Luna was sitting in a room with a sloping roof that made Sadie feel almost certain that it was contained in an attic. The various storage containers and miscellaneous oddments scattered around her leant their assurance of the accuracy of her assessment.

Luna didn't seem to be doing anything in particular. If Sadie had to guess from her posture and expression, she would say that the girl seemed to have slipped off by herself for a few alone moments. Alone time didn't seem as though it was meant to be on this occasion. The door to the room flew open and two voices that sounded awfully similar to each other began to echo off the walls despite the fact that they were making a show of speaking in dramatic, mock whispers.

"Alas, my twin, it seems that our secret haven has been discovered." The first one stated when they spotted Luna.

"And invaded, don't forget invaded." The other piped up.

"Doesn't invaded imply some sort of aggressive action?" One of the red heads (Weasely twins, Sadie processed mentally) shrugged.

"It sounded appropriate." Luna had turned but wasn't saying anything to the two. She merely watched with one of her semi detached, waiting expressions.

"Where are we going to go to escape now?" The twins looked thoughtfully at each other and then at Luna.

"We could share." One of them suggested.

"Share?" The other rolled the word off of his tongue as if it left an odd taste inside his mouth.

"Do you want to be exiled back to Auntie Muriel's company?" Both young men twitched at the sound of the name. One of them began to make pained, moaning noises and held up his hands in a defensive gesture.

"No, please no." He groaned. "Don't make me, Forge. The torture must come to an end."

"We could ask her to leave, Gred." The other suggested.

"Can't do it."

"Why?"

"She would have to go be trapped with Auntie Muriel." Both of them twitched again.

"Too true. And Mum did teach us that we shouldn't be cruel to girls."

"Right enough. Besides, Auntie Muriel isn't all."

"There's Mum's fretting."

"Sweet, but draining."

"There's Ginny and Ginny's ex."

"Awkward."

"Especially since Ginny is wandering around ready to hex things over another ex that shouldn't be an ex and only is an ex because he is being a noble prat?" The one missing an ear asked.

"Double awkward." The other agreed

"I don't think we can in good conscience consign a poor innocent to such a fate."

"After all, we were born into this madness. She's just exposed due to circumstances beyond her control."

"We're agreed then. No sacrificing of innocents for our own comfort?"

"Agreed."

"I'm feeling quite pleased with myself – very noble and chivalrous. Mum would be proud."

"'Course we can't tell her that. We would have to explain why."

"Wouldn't want to open that potential for yelling."

"There's just one problem."

"We don't want to go and deal with them either?"

"Exactly."

"That's us back to sharing then."

"Oi, you there." The hurried, tennis match of a conversation's pace was broken as both of them turned to look at Luna. She quirked an eyebrow in response.

"Do you share well?" Any response that Luna might have been inclined to make was cut off by the resumption of the twin's back and forth.

"Got on with Ginny for years, didn't she?"

"That's right. I'd forgotten about that little bundle of blond that used to trail around the house."

"Kept Gin busy, gave us more time to not get caught doing . . . things." The stage whispered voice was conspiratorial.

"We appreciated that, by the way," The one Sadie had identified as George directed at Luna.

"Wait, didn't we lock them upstairs with the ghoul once?" He turned to Luna. Sadie wondered why they kept directing questions at her that they obviously had no intention of pausing for breath long enough to let her answer. "Sorry about that. Do you hold a grudge?"

"I don't think they minded, Gred. Wasn't the poor ghoul traumatized by being decorated with paper daisy chains?"

"That's right. Never mind."

"Sharing might be fun."

"And profitable."

"How do you figure?"

"She's Ravenclaw, isn't she?"

"Ohh, brains." The response sounded vaguely zombieish.

Sadie cast a glance at Luna who was merely observing the young men in front of her as if they were something to be studied. She didn't seem to be that upset at having her solitude disrupted. Sadie couldn't decide whether the twins were entertaining or deranged. She wondered if they had always been like this, they were snapping under the strain of being in hiding, or they were putting on an intentional show for Luna's benefit. It was odd. She should be able to use the missing ear to identify which twin was which, but it wasn't nearly as obvious as it should have been. You got sucked in to their talking somehow and didn't really notice. She kept slipping up in her head and labeling them collectively as 'the twins.'

"She probably has ideas. Suggestions even. Maybe even appropriate meaningful compliments from someone who can appreciate our genius as sheer genius." The young man sounded hopeful.

"Like Hermione, only with less lecturing between the suggestions and compliments." They sighed in unison.

"I miss being pushed to greater heights of audacity." He pouted as the words were spoken before his twin slapped him on the back in one of those bizarre gestures that guys seemed to think were comforting.

"Well, we do what we can in the meantime."

"That's settled then. We shall share."

"Should we ask her?"

"She's does talk, doesn't she?"

"I'm sure she does. I remember she used to talk. We haven't given her much of a chance to talk."

"Conversation monopolizers. That's us today." He agreed before adding. "I don't think girls like that."

"You're brilliant!" The shout lost the stage whisper quality the rest of the conversation had been conducted in, and both boys began to speak in normal, everyday tones.

"I know." There was a pause. "In which particular way has my brilliance manifested itself this time?"

"She is a girl."

"Well spotted. Oh, I see. I think you are right."

"Unrelated."

"That is an important quality."

"We wouldn't want to lose our ability to be debonair through lack of practice. That would be wrong."

"That would be a horrid, shameful waste of talent."

"Wouldn't want that."

"You know how Mum feels about us wasting our talents."

"We'll do it then."

"For Mum."

"For Mum."

"Are we behaving strangely, Forge?"

"I don't know, Gred. Do people who are behaving strangely know that they are behaving strangely? Or does the mindset that induces strange behavior preclude the noticing of the aforementioned behaviors that are strange?"

"I don't know either."

"I just thought the cabin fever might be getting to us."

"She might be able to tell us."

"That's another advantage to sharing."

"She doesn't look afraid."

"Sometimes people laugh if one is acting strange."

"Does she laugh?"

"Everyone should."

"I don't think I've heard her laugh here."

"Let me think. No. There's been no laughing."

"A challenge?"

"I'm thinking so."

"I like challenges." The identical smiles that flitted across the boys' faces were a little disturbing, fundamentally good natured, but still a little disturbing. Sadie found herself feeling concerned for what the two were plotting and what effects it might have on Luna's mental health.

"Let the sharing begin."

Sadie found that only one thought was echoing through her brain as the memory came to an end. That was unexpected.


	10. Dean Thomas

Sadie had always been very fond of letters. There was something majestic and classy about that form of communication that seemed to be lacking from the telephone saturated world in which her paternal grandparents lived. There was something about being able to see a conversation composed in ink in front of you and knowing that you could hold on to it and relive it any time you wanted that was comforting and beautiful. Even howlers had had their charm at a certain point in her life. Listening to the normally perpetually collected voice of her mother be distorted and accompanied by the attendant smoke and flames was actually entertaining.

Her days of waxing poetical about the beauty of letter writing as the pinnacle of human communication, however, were rapidly drawing to a close. Why? Because in the life in which she now found herself, letters were an unwelcome nuisance which required an answer – even when she didn't feel like doing any answering.

6 February 2010

Dear Sadie,

Here are my editorial notes on your first chapters. Well done, dear. Remember when you told me that you wanted to capture the sense of awe of history as a story and put it to paper? You've succeeded. I could not have asked for a better welcome home present after that exhausting bout of firefighting that I had to handle in the former colonies.

I hear Constance has been being her usual self. Don't let her crack you. I've seen the deadline list our dear publisher has outlined for you. Don't let him bury you. If you need more time, tell him so. He's a sweet man, but he'll push as much as he knows he can get by with pushing.

Let's get together and discuss some avenue possibilities over lunch as soon as the writing/deadline fog lifts on you a bit.

Yours,

Nat

For some reason, that completely normal letter absolutely infuriated Sadie every time she looked at it. Scratch that. She knew what the reason was. It was because it was a completely normal letter. There was something just plain wrong with receiving normal letters from Natalie after what she had seen at the Battle of Hogwarts. She was different for knowing that the woman who had given her her first job and started her on the path of making her writing dream a reality had been connected to her family all along and never bothered to tell her. It made her perception of Natalie different. It made their relationship different. Didn't it? She just couldn't go on as if nothing had changed, could she? Natalie had to have known that there was a possibility that she was going to find out, hadn't she? Why could she not simply have told her herself?

6 February 2010

Sadie,

I'm not pushing. I'm just strongly suggesting that you stop stalling and apologize to Drake. We both know you are going to eventually anyway. I'm urging sooner over later.

Then, talk to your dad. You'll feel better. I know. You know that I know, so just listen to me already. You are probably sitting in that apartment trying to drown yourself in work in an attempt to ignore the reality of your life, and it isn't working. You'll be able to concentrate much better after you deal with everything.

Adrienne

Of course Adrienne was right. Adrienne had a depressingly repetitive habit of being right. It wasn't like Sadie didn't know these things that Adrienne kept saying. She simply didn't want to acknowledge their accuracy. Her parents had actively lied to her for the entirety of her existence, couldn't she have a few days to mope and be angry over it?

7 February 2010

Darling,

I'm back from my jaunt to the continent. Everything is ship shape over there, and I hope it is here as well. What lovely surprises have you dug up for me while I've been away? I can hardly wait to hear about them all. We'll have to get tea reset with my parents as soon as possible.

I hear that Natalie has finally managed to finagle some semblance of order back into the American offices, but you musn't let her distract you. Never mind any nonsensical loyalty issues about being hired by her department first. You have developed something wonderful that will revolutionize the world of nonfiction. We can't let such a thing be wasted on mere textbooks.

Of course, we will make those as well, but this is a grand enterprise. It is far too important not to be shared with the world. You are far too important not to be shared with the world. You are going to become history yourself, deary. And I don't mean the dry, boring kind. You shall be the Rita Skeeter of your generation, and I am so proud that I can be a part of the process.

Don't forget to bring your source material with you for our meeting. Drop me an owl and let me know which day this week will work best for you.

Looking forward to it,

Constance

It was official. Constance was so not Sadie's favorite person. It wasn't that she had ever been in serious consideration for that slot (or even in the bottom tiers of the running for that matter), but she had thought that she would at least be helpful. Helpful and Constance obviously did not mix. Constance's ideas, Constance's personality, and Constance's position as technically one of Sadie's bosses were all huge, problematic whirlpools in the tranquil forest pool of Sadie's life. Which may have been the world's worst analogy, because Sadie's life at the moment was absolutely anything but tranquil. She didn't want to have to answer Constance's letter. She didn't want to have to deal with Constance. She wasn't going to deal with Constance. She was going to ignore Constance until she was forced unignorably directly into her life path and hope that something miraculous occurred to end the situation in the meantime. Yeah, she was definitely going to pay for that decision later. She knew that. Right now she just happened to not be in a mood to care.

7 February 2010

Sade,

I'm not mad, you know? I know you were just upset, and I was pushing you to deal too fast. I know you didn't mean it. You can write me back, and I won't bite your head off. I know you are sitting there in that apartment fretting about that.

I could come over again, and we could talk about things that have absolutely nothing to do with your dad. It would be nice to get to spend a little time with you when we weren't bickering.

Drake

It had been nice to spend time with Drake when they weren't bickering. It had been nice to be able to cry on his shoulder (literally) and bewail the mess that her life had suddenly become. The problem was that any attempt at conversation with Drake was going to end up where the previous one had – with lots of yelling. She was still mad, and she wasn't in a mood to be talked out of being mad. She was feeling guilty over Luna and didn't want to admit it because she might just be told that she deserved to feel guilty.

Drake wasn't going to let her get by with that. He expected better from her. Adrienne did too for that matter. That was why neither one of them was getting a letter back (or an invitation over either) until she somehow managed to calm down.

No letters for her best friends because she was angry. No letter to either of her bosses because she was angry. No letter in response to the missive from her parents that she hadn't even opened because she was angry. There was a definite pattern here.

She even had a letter (also unopened) from Drake's parents. What was up with that? He couldn't just wait for her to calm down? Didn't he know her better than that by now? He had to sic his dad on her to berate her for being unreasonable as well? What was going to be next? A letter from Justin Finch-Fletchley containing a dissertation on why father's sometimes believed it was justifiable and necessary to lie to their daughters? Seriously?

She had wasted enough time on the pile of correspondence that she was not answering. She needed to get some work done. Unfortunately, she was still agitated. She needed to start with something simple. She reached for Luna's reply about Dean Thomas. That would be a simple task that she could get her work focus back with – a simple yes or no answer with a simple thank you for your time and help fired back in response. As she was breaking the seal, she remembered that she had accidentally placed her charm on this parchment as well.

**I have a friend who has been helping me by finding contact information for the original members of the DA. She has managed to find details on all but one. She keeps running into dead ends when trying to locate Dean Thomas. **

**I understand that you were in hiding together at one point in time, and I thought I would ask if you had kept in touch. Do you have any idea as to how I might get a hold of him? Any information you have would be quite helpful. Thank you so much.**

_You will not be able to locate Dean Thomas. You should cross him off your list of potential contacts._

Luna was stepping out of the door of a shop in what could only be Diagon Alley. Her head was down as she looked over a piece of parchment resting in her hands. The fact that she was not watching where she was going did not seem to impede her progress in any way, shape, or form. She moved with what Sadie had dubbed in her head the usual Luna grace, and she intuitively side stepped any obstacles in her path without raising her head. She did not really look older than the Luna Sadie had watched in the last set of memories, but something seemed different. It was her clothing; Sadie decided. It looked . . . was professional the word for which she was looking?

Sadie's pondering was interrupted by a tall, young man who made his way down the sidewalk and deliberately placed himself directly in Luna's path. Was he trying to trip her? Luna stopped short just in time and blinked up at him. A smile flitted across her features as she greeted him.

"Hullo, Dean."

"Hey, Luna," the man muttered sounding entirely unconvincing. "Sorry about that. I guess I should pay more attention to where I am walking."

Luna tilted her head to the side and watched as a stream of nervous attempts to start a new sentence were tried and abandoned. "It's nice to see you," she said. "I'm running errands for work." She informed him.

"Oh, right. It's really nice to see you too." He spoke up. "I guess I should let you get to those errands."

Luna looked at him for another moment before nodding in his direction and beginning to walk away. She made it all of two steps before the man (whom Sadie was going to conclude must be Dean Thomas) reached out a hand to stop her.

"Wait." He said in a voice that bordered on pleading. The speed at which he was speaking increased while he was talking until the last few words of the sentence were almost indistinguishable from each other.

"I was thinking that I could meet you after work and take you out to dinner today. Or another time if that would be better. I know it's late notice, and I don't expect you to change your plans or anything. I just thought that maybe you might like to go?"

Whether Luna spent the next few beats trying to untangle what that mush of words had been like Sadie did, or whether she was pondering the invitation, Sadie couldn't tell. She could only see the outcome of the brilliantly bright smile that spread across the man's face as Luna replied.

"Six o'clock?"

He nodded vigorously and stood in the middle of the walk as Luna continued on to complete her errands.

Luna was dancing with Dean off to the side of an open dance floor under the stars. Streamers and lanterns decorated nearby trees, and everyone seemed to be wearing dress robes. Sadie decided that it must be a wedding.

Whose wedding it was, however, was not nearly as important as the sound that Luna was making as her dance partner spun her out and then gently brought her back to rest her head on his chest. She was laughing. It was light hearted and carefree and child like and the sound fit Luna perfectly. It sounded like the giggling Sadie had witnessed in one of Luna's early memories of her mother. It was a sound that Sadie had not heard in any of the memories since.

It could have been the fact that there had been such a cloud over the time of so many memories of Luna's, but Sadie had a niggling suspicion that that sound had been completely missing from Luna's life from the time that her mother had gone until the man twirling her around the dance floor had worked himself into her world.

There was nothing much to the memory. There was no conversation; there were no dramatic revelations. It was solely and entirely two young people dancing in the middle of a crowd that Sadie felt certain neither one of them noticed was there.

Sadie paused the playing before it could move on to the third memory. Luna and Dean Thomas? That just felt so wrong somehow. It was entirely unexpected. He hadn't so much as made an appearance in any of Luna's other memories. What about Neville? She found herself thinking (which she then corrected herself on because after all Luna had ended up married to Rolf Scamander and Sadie had known that all along and it was ridiculous to be all expectant over a romance that probably never was when you knew that the two people involved didn't end up together anyway but everything up until that point had just felt like Luna and Neville fit and Dean Thomas had come out of nowhere and it didn't even make sense given the rest of what Sadie knew and speaking of ridiculous, why in the world was she thinking in run on sentences?).

Something was bothering her about those memories though. Somewhere in the part of her brain that was detail obsessed Sadie felt like she had overlooked something important while watching them. She set them to playing again and tried to figure out what it was that she had noticed without processing.

She was correct (although when she spotted what it was, she almost wished that she hadn't been). There was something she had overlooked in her first viewing. Rather, it was someone.

In the first memory, he had been three or so doorways down pretending to window shop as he waited for her to approach. When Dean had come out of seemingly nowhere and pulled his accidently on purpose almost run in, he had frozen in place watching the two of them.

Sadie didn't think he could hear the words being exchanged from where he was standing, but it didn't take a genius to follow the gist of the body language. His eyes closed, and he bit his lip as Dean reached out to stop Luna from leaving. When she walked away the second time, Neville Longbottom ducked into the shop he was standing in front of to prevent Luna from noticing that he was there.

He was sitting at a table with a few busily chattering girls at the wedding. They surreptitiously tried to catch his eye and looked at him sometimes as if wondering what his problem was and why he wasn't dancing. He was too busy watching Luna to notice.

He smiled faintly as the sound of her laughter reached his ears before something in his eyes changed to an expression that could only be described as resigned. He looked away from the dancing couple he had been focusing on so intently and scanned the nearby tables. He excused himself to disappointed looks all around and walked over to ask another blond haired girl (who had apparently been abandoned at her table) to dance.

That was almost disturbing. She let the third memory play this time. It was disturbing in and of itself. Only this time, it had absolutely nothing to do with Neville Longbottom.

Luna and Dean were sitting together on a small sofa in what looked to be an equally small apartment. The furniture was sturdy, practical stuff, but the implication that the owner was not interested in the aesthetics of the place couldn't last past your first glance at the walls. Artwork adorned the walls profusely, but each piece had its own separate piece of the room. The space between kept the walls from looking busy and overcrowded, yet you could tell that each piece had been placed in the vicinity of its neighbors for a reason. The various works seemed to flow from one to the next. The effect was much like walking into a well-designed gallery.

Sadie had plenty of time to take in the full effect of what was (in all honesty) a stunningly beautiful room because the two young adults seated in the room weren't speaking. If she kept with the artist's motive of surveying the room, the two would be a tableau. They both sat sideways, so they were facing each other – Luna was looking at Dean, but he wasn't looking back at her. Dean's head was turned down. His eyes were fixed on the hands settled in his lap that clenched and unclenched in a nervous gesture. His shoulders radiated tension, and his breathing was rather shakey sounding. It wasn't anger or agitation from Sadie's perspective. He looked sad – very, very sad – and as if he were about to break down and lose his composure. Luna's eyes were wide with concern, and her hands sat in her lap clutched together as if to brace herself from betraying any impatience for him to hurry up and explain to her what was wrong.

Taking a deep breath, Dean finally decided to start speaking. "Do you know how a few weeks ago you asked me to tell you what was bothering me?"

Luna nodded in response. "You said you weren't ready to tell me."

Dean gave a half-hearted chuckle. "Anyone else would have pestered and demanded. You just let me be. Thank you for that."

Luna looked confused. "You said you needed time," she stated as if that were a complete explanation in and of itself.

"I did need time," he continued. "But I was also hoping that I could work it out, and I wouldn't have to tell you." He paused before finally looking up to meet Luna's gaze. "I still don't want to tell you. I don't want it to be this way. I just . . . I just don't know what else to do."

Luna reached over without looking and grasped one of his hands with a comforting squeeze. The gesture just seemed to push Dean that much closer to the tears he was already on the edge of producing.

"I hate this." He spat with a sudden venom that made Sadie jump. Luna just took it in stride and retained her hold on the man's hand. He clutched at it and brought his other hand up so that both her hands were caught between his own. He pulled them up and kissed the palms before placing them (still held tightly) on his lap. Luna had to edge closer in response, and Dean stared at her with a frantic kind of intensity before his shoulders slumped and his head dropped once again.

"I don't want to leave you." He muttered so softly that Sadie wasn't sure if she had heard the words or imagined them.

"Dean?" Luna questioned sounding as if she weren't certain whether or not she had heard the words either.

"I've tried so hard to get past it. I really, really tried. Everyone else seems to have gotten over it all. None of them are letting it ruin their lives. I don't know what is wrong with me. I don't know why I can't let it go, but I can't. I've tried everything I can think to do. It wasn't supposed to be like this. Everything was supposed to go back to normal once the war was over, but I'm so mixed up that I don't even know what normal is any more. Did we ever have normal, Luna? Or did we just have times when we weren't paying attention to how screwed up everything was?"

Luna looked from Dean's face to her hands still being held onto for dear life in his lap and back up again. She wisely chose not to attempt an answer. She let him continue to talk.

"I thought it would get better. Harry would fix things, and I would forget about it. Get a job. Get my girl." He paused and looked up at her with a heartbreakingly longing smile. "Everything fell into place. And you . . . you were like some unbelievably benevolent reward to make up for all the bad things that happened before. I don't know what's wrong with me, Luna. I should be so happy."

He broke at this point, and the long held back tears began to slide down his face.

"I see it every time I close my eyes. I'm back in those woods being chased. I can hear the killing curse that they fired at Ted. They shouldn't have gotten him, Luna. He was smarter than that. He was doing just fine until he let me tag along. He faced off with them to give me time to run, Luna. And I did. I didn't even think about it. He told me to run, and I just ran. I left him. He died because of me." His voice was getting progressively angrier as he spoke. Surprisingly, instead of becoming louder, it was getting softer all the time.

"All of it was so nonsensically stupid, Luna. I was running because I didn't know if I had to run or not. I had to run because they decided to cull people based on something so completely insignificant and arbitrary that there isn't even a way to check for it. For all I know my old man could have been a wizard, but I'll never know. And I was hunted for not knowing. What kind of world is this that I chose to leave my family to be a part of? They knew this was coming. All of them knew this was coming. The blood purity mania has been around for centuries, and it has never even occurred to any of them that they should do something to try to teach better. They just let it go. They mutter about people's private opinions and wait until it all blows up in everybody's faces to do anything about it. How do you trust a world like that? How do you trust people like that? How do you keep yourself from looking over your shoulder every day paranoid that it is all going to start all over again? I can't. I can't stop. I can't let it go."

Tears were flowing down Luna's face as well now. Or, they would have been, had her head not been buried in Dean's shoulder. He had pulled her in close and was murmuring his words into her hair.

"I'm never going to be okay here. I want to be so badly. I've worked so hard. Nothing helps. It's no use. I will never be right in this world. I'll never be undamaged in this world. I can't stay here."

The troubled young man gently kissed Luna on the forehead. "I'm going back to the muggle world. I need your help."

"I'll go with you." Luna immediately piped up in a determined tone of voice that contrasted with the tears still coursing down her cheeks.

"No!" Dean's voice was commanding and pleading all at once. "This is your world, Luna. It's the only one you've ever known. Your family is here. Your friends are here. Your life is here. You will not give that up because I'm an unsalvageable mess. I'm not going to stay here and drag you down with me. I'm not going to have you drug down by following me into a world that you don't belong in."

"What if I belong with you?" Luna demanded pulling herself out of Dean's arms and sitting with her arms crossed and eyes blazing."

"Even if you did," he said with a sigh, "that man isn't going to exist anymore."

"You don't have any right to tell me . . ."

"Promise me that you'll let me go. Promise me that you won't come after me."

"I don't chase after people that don't want me."

Dean blanched, and his voice shook as he spoke. "You should hate me. It would be easier that way. I should just let you think that that is why, but I'm too selfish for that. It's not about not wanting you, Luna. It's never been about not wanting you. I want you so much that it hurts to breathe when I think about my life with you not in it."

"Then, I don't understand."

"I may be selfish, Luna, but I'm not that selfish. It has to be about you. I could stay and let you nurse maid me for the rest of our lives. I can't do that to you. I can't let you live a life with someone who you can't trust not to break down, not to go off the deep end with no warning. Never knowing what might set me off. Never knowing how to break me out of it when I get scared and won't leave the house for days on end. Never knowing when you might walk into the house and have a wand at your throat because I've lost track of where and when I am and I'm seeing them instead of you. I'm not safe, Luna. I'm broken. I don't want to be, but I am. You will not live like that."

He held out his hand with a begging expression, and Luna caved and placed her own back in it. "It wouldn't be like that."

"Yes, it would."

"What makes you think going back to the muggle world will make it any better. Here there are people who understand. Here there are people that can help. I can help."

"It won't be better."

"What's the point . . ."

"Let me finish. It won't be better if I just go back knowing all the things that I know now. But, if I don't know it. If I don't know that there was ever any other world to know, then it will work. I won't be the same Dean that you know. That's part of why I will not let you go with me. But I should be a Dean that isn't broken."

"Should be? What if that doesn't work either?"

"It will. Because you are brilliant, and you are going to do it for me."

"What!"

"Remember the memory charm that Hermione did on her parents? I want you to do that for me. Only I want you to make it irreversible." He put a finger over her lips to stop the protest that she was about to utter. "It makes me a jerk and a cad and a lousy human being to ask it of you. I know it does. It's awful of me, and I deserve every angry, hurt word you could possibly shout at me right now. I hate it, but it doesn't change anything. I trust you. I know if you give me your word you will do it and do it right and respect my wishes and let me disappear. I know you'll give me your word because I know you. I know you will do absolutely anything to protect your friends. We were friends first. We're still friends. You're my best friend. Only don't tell Seamus because we all know how jealous he can get."

Luna shook her head at Dean's weak attempt at humor, but she didn't try to interrupt him again.

"I'm asking, actually I'm begging you, Luna, to do this for me because I have come at it from every angle there is and this is the only way. I'm asking you, as your friend, to protect me from this void I'm hovering on the edge of the only way I can be protected. I'm begging you to save me, Luna, because this is the only way that at least part of who I am supposed to be can be saved."

Luna pulled her hands from his grasp and turned away so that Dean could no longer see her face. Sadie could still see her. The tears had started up again running from underneath her closed eyelids. Sadie expected to see angry or devastated or even disbelieving. What she saw was blank.

"Don't answer me tonight." Dean was telling her. "Think about it for a few days. You'll know that I'm right."

The memory faded and Sadie found herself crying as she stared at the still bare wall in front of her. She had been very wrong. There had been nothing simple about Luna's answer at all.


	11. End

**What was it like in the immediate aftermath of that final battle? Was everyone relieved, shocked, or did it take some time for everything to sink in as real? How did you feel?**

_I suspect everyone reacted a little differently to the events of that day. There were many things to take in; there were many things to reconcile. I doubt that anyone could have told you exactly what they were feeling. It was a great jumble of emotions that are difficult to parcel out into their individual origins._

The great hall had always seemed large during Sadie's school days. It seemed even larger, somehow, when it was filled with the injured and the dead. She had known. She had thought she had known. If she had learned nothing else from this experience, she had come to understand that knowing was vastly different from seeing. The rows felt endless. They stretched onward in a surreal tribute to the damage that could be created as a consequence of one person's insatiable desire for power being set loose upon the world.

Dean Thomas had had a valid point. Sadie was forced to concede as she surveyed the carnage and loss in front of her. It was difficult to trust a world where such things could happen. The muggle world, however, was no different. The methods were changed, but the results stayed the same. Evil found a foothold and continued to grow and spread until it was checked. How much damage was done was always directly proportional to how long it was ignored. People were too busy, too disbelieving, too wrapped in their own little section of the universe to pay attention until something small that could easily be snuffed out had become something huge and menacing and out of control. Why don't we choose to fight the small battles while they are small? Why do we persist in clinging to the fallacy that those things ignored cannot touch us when we have always see it proven wrong?

Of course, sometimes such things were stopped before they started. But, did they really matter? It was the ones that were not that left their blot on history. Sadie shook off her philosophical rambling and forced herself to focus on the memory. Luna was standing by herself watching a knot of red heads gathered around one of the bodies. One of the young men (Sadie was too caught up in the emotions of the scene to fill in the names even though she should know them by now) pushed off his sister's restraining hand and stalked partially across the room. His eyes were glazed over and disbelieving – that was, they were, until they suddenly focused on one of the bodies that had no attendant mourners.

She looked to be about his age and had the calm, untouched look of those struck by the Avada Kadavra curse. There was something unnatural about such a violent, hate filled curse leaving no signs of violence in its wake. Then again, there was something unnatural about people creating a method of killing with words. George (his name finally clicked into place inside Sadie's head) stared at the girl for a few long moments as if what he was seeing refused to register in his brain, but he couldn't look away until it did. He sank to his knees in front of her and buried his face in his hands. Silent sobs shook his shoulders as the memory faded away.

The bodies had been moved. The hall was still filled with people, but these people were vibrant and alive and loud. It was as though the room had undergone some sort of bipolar mood shift. Luna was sitting next to Harry. Sadie watched as she orchestrated his escape. Despite her confusion over the change in mood, Sadie was forced to smile at Luna's choice of distractions. Some things in this world were, apparently, constant. Luna sat at the table watching Ron and Hermione follow the invisible Harry out of the room. She turned her head and spent a few minutes looking at Ginny sitting beside her mother before turning again to locate Neville sitting amidst a group of clamoring girls who kept reaching out to touch the sword in front of him in awe. It was crowded enough that Luna was still hemmed in by people at the table, but Sadie couldn't shake the feeling that she was very, very much alone.

Luna was standing on the school grounds all alone in the afternoon sunshine. Craters were scattered throughout the yard, but Luna was looking at the castle itself. Piles of stones marked the places where parts of walls had ended their journeys after being blasted or knocked down. It was the home away from home that Sadie had known, but in an injured from. It still managed to look majestic. It was battered but still standing. From Sadie's side of history, she could call up the image of the repaired and rebuilt building. The currently visible flaws were familiar to Sadie because of the slightly discolored masonry that marked the same places in her own memories. She had always wondered why, with all the magic at the disposal of the staff, they had never caused it to match. It had never been glaringly obvious, but it you looked the difference had always been visible.

Now, Sadie thought that maybe she understood. The question wasn't why had they not. It was why should they? The stone wasn't the same. It had been repaired. It had needed to be repaired. Why pretend otherwise? Events left marks that couldn't or shouldn't be covered over. Done is done; it can't be erased. You could try to make everything look the same, but it still would not actually be the same. Why deny instead of remember? Whoever had made that decision when the building was repaired, Sadie felt that they had been very wise. Looking at the blond soaking in the sight and the sunshine as the memory faded out, Sadie wondered if the people involved found it as easy to admit and accept the pieces of themselves that had been irrevocably changed as well.

9 February 2038

Sadie,

What were you thinking? It's bad enough that your friends are once again not worth your time, but you didn't even send a note to say you weren't coming. How do you think Drake felt spending the entire evening explaining to his parents why his "best" friend not only couldn't be bothered, but also couldn't even extend the common courtesy of a decline response? I'm so angry at you I could spit. Get your act together before you wake up and find the rest of us have decided that we value your friendship just as much has you value ours.

Adrienne

Okay, so she'd obviously screwed up. That letter from Drake's parents must have been a dinner invitation. She couldn't have gone; she was much too busy. She felt bad that she hadn't sent a reply of course. That had been very rude and probably awkward for Mr. and Mrs. Boot. But Adrienne, Adrienne was way over reacting. What was wrong with her? She didn't have time for this. She would send the Boots an apology as soon as she had some time.

**What was it like going back to school after everything was over?**

School went back very much to what school had been before. We were the ones who were different. There were places inside the school that seemed different because we had different memories of them. There were things that were different because we no longer saw them in the same way.

She was back in the Great Hall again. She (Luna) had paused beside Ginny in the doorway. Ginny was looking around as if she had never seen the room before. Sadie struggled to find what it was that was capturing her attention so. It appeared to be a normal evening meal. It wasn't a feast or a festive occasion. There was nothing that should have led to Ginny's fascinated stare. Then, she saw it. The hall looked empty. Less than half the seats were occupied. The students were chatty and laughing and normal. The little first years would never know that there was something wrong with the picture. Those who had seen it under different circumstances – Luna, Ginny, Sadie – would feel vaguely, undefinably uncomfortable without the crowd and higher level of noise that they would always associate with the place.

"I hadn't noticed," Ginny said looking at Luna who merely nodded in acknowledgment. "I've been avoiding looking around. I didn't want to think about it. I didn't want to remember. I haven't noticed how quiet it is, how many spaces there are . . ." Her voice trailed off, and she shook her head. "Is she still in the library?"

Luna nodded again. "She won't come down."

"She doesn't want to see what I just saw, does she?"

"I think there's something more."

"She doesn't want to remember?"

"I think she remembers too much."

The three girls (Luna, Ginny, and Hermione) were sitting in various postures on the floor of an obviously unused classroom. A stack of textbooks towered in the center of their circle. The girls made the occasional comment, but mostly they worked on their individual assignments in silence. Sadie had spent similar nights in her common room with Adrienne and Drake. She, though, had had the advantage of comfortable furniture. The quiet was broken by the sound of footsteps approaching the classroom door. It was funny how you could always identify teachers from fellow students by the sound of the footsteps.

"Professor McGonagall," the girls chorused as the door swung on hinges sadly in need of oil.

"Ladies this is the third time this week that you have been present in unauthorized areas."

Luna and Ginny shrugged. Hermione chose to respond. "It won't be the last."

"I understand that the three of you . . ."

"You don't understand." Hermione interjected.

"I beg your pardon?"

"May Luna join us in our common room?" She asked.

"You know that is not permitted."

"May we join Luna in her common room?" She continued with a long suffering, patient tone.

"Miss Granger . . . "

"Then, we will continue to choose this course of action." The two women simply looked at each other for a long moment. The older woman sighed.

"I will see what I can do."

The only talking in the third memory was done by a hat – the sorting hat. It was singing.

Unless the fences really mend

They will simply fall again

Let us learn lest we see

What will be is what has been

Across the aisles to fix the wounds

Knowing we are more the same

Than any difference I may find

When the teacher calls your name

I hope this time you understand

When I end my warning song

What it is you should do

And where it is that we go wrong

9 February 2038

Sadie,

My apologies, darling. I should have checked back with you sooner. Those troublesome owls are really getting out of hand because I know you would never ignore my correspondence. We will get together to go over your source material tomorrow afternoon. Let me know what time. I know you would never get prima donnaish on me, so I know you will be timely in your response.

Constance

**There were so many emotions and changes to be dealt with in the aftermath of Voldemort's time in power. Your group of friends seems to have dusted themselves off and gone on to lives of (relative) normalcy. Did you notice anyone struggling to make the adjustment? What do you think was the contributing factor in how well you all adjusted?**

Sadie felt herself flush looking at the question she had written before seeing the Dean Thomas memories. It was so easy to look at the survivors with their families and jobs and notations in the margins of history and think that that was all that mattered. It was so easy to ignore the damage that wasn't visible. Would anyone who hadn't truly known those individuals both before and after ever be able to understand exactly what that fight against evil had cost them? Maybe not.

Sadie did understand one thing that had been fuzzy in her world view before this whole project started. She knew the why. She knew the answer to why them. She knew the answer to why then. Her cynicism and doubt had been washed against the rocks of Luna's blunt honesty and shattered in the process. It was funny how she really didn't count it as a loss. It was funny how instead of learning all about Luna she seemed to be learning all about herself. Although she knew that the answer to her question must be that they had struggled (and that the methods of their coping weren't really her business), she had asked and been answered. She might as well let the parchment play.

_Everyone copes with change (catastrophic or gradual) in a slightly (or not so slightly) different way. Some people keep all their struggles internal, some advertise it for the world at large, and some try to continue their lives denying that any change has taken place. We were no different. I am sure that were you to survey the bulk of those involved, you would receive as many variations on the theme of "how did you cope" as people of whom you inquired. _

_It isn't necessarily how you cope that leads to the ability to frame your life within the new normal and sojourn forward. It is the fact that you actually do the coping that opens up that road. If you are blessed (and we were very much so), you have friends that help you along your way. Sometimes it is by giving you the space you need to make your adjustments, and sometimes it is pushing you to recognize that adjustments need to be made. The trick of a good friend is to know someone well enough to know the difference._

The Hogwarts' Express had featured so prominently in so many of Luna's memories that Sadie was not surprised to find herself back on it. It was still quieter than Sadie would have defined as normal, but the quiet was filled with hopeful expectation this time instead of dread. Luna and Ginny were alone in the compartment.

"She's missed the train," Ginny was saying with a mixture of concern and annoyance.

"She might have boarded after us."

"Where is she then?" Ginny sighed and took a deep breath after almost yelling. "You don't know what it has been like. She hasn't answered any letters for over a month. She might not even be in England. Ron's going frantic. You saw him at the station. I thought I was done spending all my time fretting over people." Her head met her hands and the last bit came out muffled. "I'm turning into Mum."

Whatever comforting (or not so comforting) response Luna was going to make was interrupted by the appearance of Hermione in the doorway. She looked run down, tired, and her shoulders held so much tension they resembled a drawn back bowstring.

"Hullo." Luna greeted sounding more cautious than Sadie had ever heard her.

"You've made it!" Ginny exclaimed launching herself at the girl who looked as if her friend's embrace pained her. She pulled back a bit and regained some of her composure. "Are your parents all settled back at home?"

Hermione shook her head slowly. "They're still in Australia."

"I'm so sorry," Ginny informed her edging in for another embrace. Hermione held her off with a raised hand.

"I still think the reversal will work. I just didn't try."

"I don't understand." Hermione's face and manner turned aloof as she replied.

"They are perfectly happy where they are. Why bother to burden them with worry over a daughter who is just going to leave them again?"

Luna and Ginny were crouched against a wall in some part of the castle unknown to Sadie. Ginny was once again doing the talking.

"It's as though something sucked all the life right out of her and left behind this empty shell caricature. She goes to class, she studies, she sits in the library, she does perfect work, and she knows the answer to every question a teacher asks her. She also doesn't sleep, stares off into space whenever she thinks no one is noticing, has red, blotchy eyes whenever she comes back from being alone, avoids talking whenever possible, hasn't answered any of Ron's or Harry's letters, and she just isn't her. I can't take it any more. We're losing her, and I don't know why."

"It's going to be okay."

"How do you know that?"

"Because we won't let it not be."

All three of the girls stood in a semi-dark classroom in the third memory. Whatever Ginny and Luna had to say had obviously already been said because no one except Hermione had the floor.

"So, you thought what precisely? That you were going to stage some sort of intervention? I don't need an intervention. I'm finally thinking clearly. More clearly than I have in ages. Maybe more clearly than I have in my entire life. I am perfectly aware of my place in the universe and how lousy I am at filling it. I am just fine!"

"Hermione . . . we just want to help." Ginny began.

"Help?" Hermione scoffed. "Why bother? After what I've done to you? After what I've done to all of them? I'm not worth it." Her voice became louder and simultaneously more difficult to understand as the now nearing hysterical girl continued. She was sobbing and breathless but continued to try to talk. The result was the uttering of a whole lot of broken, difficult to understand pieces of thoughts all jumbled into one long, flowing indistinguishable mass.

"Parents . . . without . . . happier now . . . would have been happier all along . . . abnormal child . . . so much stress . . . not understanding . . . put them through . . . left them . . . put first . . . cancelled . . . never complained . . . made targets . . . didn't tell, actually lied . . . boggart right . . . always fail everything . . . nobody wanted . . . bossy . . . boring . . . only good for helping . . . not really like . . . wouldn't want for a friend . . . couldn't even do that right . . . always let them down . . . Harry . . . tried to tell . . . wouldn't listen . . . I didn't make him listen . . . could have saved . . . only tried harder . . . shouldn't have let him go . . . wasn't good enough to listen to . . . Sirius . . . dead because I failed . . . Harry's chance for a family . . . I killed it . . . let them get me . . . didn't protect them . . . let them down . . . could have been killed . . . useless . . . Ron didn't want . . . was stupid . . . Lavender . . . better than me . . . only makes sense . . . who would want . . . too nice to me . . . I was too dense . . . petty . . . should have been there to help . . . poison . . . could have lost him . . . should have figured it out faster . . . took so long . . . he left because I was too slow . . . what was the point of taking me . . . broke his wand . . . messed up . . . all me . . . didn't think fast enough . . . shield charm . . . something . . . blocked the rubble . . . stopped it . . . too slow . . . didn't think . . . supposed to be the smart one . . . supposed to think fast . . . killed his brother . . . never look at me again . . . keeps writing me . . . can't read it . . . doesn't he think I know . . . can't leave me alone . . . sorry I let his brother die . . . so sorry . . . what does he want . . . tell me he hates me in person . . . can't take that . . . please, anything but that . . ."

The ranting tapered off into a desperate gasping, sobbing noise that could no longer be formed into words as Hermione sank into a quivering ball on the floor. Nothing she had said really made any sense to Sadie, but it seemed to mean something to Luna and Ginny. The two exchanged a heartbroken look of mixed angst and knowledge before converging on the broken girl. The memory ended in a haze of group hugging, sobbing, and murmured comforting noises.

Well, that was . . . intense. Any further introspection on Sadie's part was cut off by the owl at her window. The thickness of the envelope made her think that Adrienne had struck gold somewhere in her research, but she was disappointed at what actually tumbled out onto her lap. It was a stack of pictures each of which was a wizarding shot of Sadie and Drake. There were so many of them (granted seven years of boarding school was a long time and Adrienne was the shutter bug of the group so it wasn't that common for her to be behind the camera instead of in front of it but still . . .), when had they all been taken? Never mind. What was Adrienne playing at? There was no note. There was no explanation. There was just a stack of pictures. She didn't have time for this. She really didn't have time for this because another owl was tapping persistently at her window.

10 February 2038

Sadie,

I thought your deadline was the 14th? Why is Constance running round demanding your head on a platter for failure to make adequate progress? I think we all had better get together and sort things out before this gets out of hand.

Nat

**Was it difficult for you to leave England to pursue your career? You seem to have been very close to your friends during the war. Was it difficult to give up that safety net of support?**

_It is, of course, difficult to leave ones friends and family to start a new chapter in your life. It is also, sometimes, very worth it. I happened to have an extended family of friends who believed in me and wanted what was best for me. I didn't really leave my safety net behind me._

"I want you to be happy. I just wish you didn't have to go away to do it." Ginny was sighing over a cup of tea across the table from Luna at an outdoor café. "If this is about Dean, I'm sure he will be back from whatever soul searching thing he is doing soon."

"He isn't coming back."

"What?"

"I said he isn't coming back."

Ginny suddenly sounded angry. "Are you telling me that he left you!"

"We've already talked about this."

"But I thought . . . I didn't realize . . . Oh, Luna."

"It's fine, Ginny. I'm fine." She took in her friend's skeptical, don't lie to me expression and amended. "I will be fine."

"Please tell me this isn't why you are leaving."

"It isn't, not really."

"Make me understand."

"The rest of you make plans, and they come to be. They may meander on the path a bit, but they happen. When I try to make plans, they never work out. They always fall through. I tried making new plans, but they crumbled on me as well. I think that I am done with planning. I think I am ready to go back to just letting the journey happen. Do you understand that?"

"I do." Ginny paused for a moment. "Are you letting the journey happen, or are you running from the path because you're tired of the meandering?"

Luna sipped her tea instead of answering. Ginny looked pensive.

"What you said about meandering paths? Before our plans work out? He's finally ditched the fan girls."

It was the closest Sadie had ever seen Luna to glaring. "A few minutes ago you were worried over Dean."

"Luna . . ."

"I don't chase after people who don't want me."

Luna was straightening up the contents of shelves in the back of a shop. A much older man was talking to her.

"I'm happy that I've had you for as long as I have. Of course, I wouldn't say no to keeping you longer."

Luna turned and smiled at the man. "I am going to miss you."

"I imagine you will miss many things."

Luna shrugged. "If I didn't go, I would miss those things that I'm going to do now."

"That is the trouble with the road not taken, my dear."

"That there always is one no matter which one you take?"

"Indeed."

Harry, Ron, Hermione, and Ginny were gathered around Luna at what appeared to be the Ministry's Portkey Departure Office. The conversation was everything you would expect from a group of close-knit friends saying a good-bye to one of their own. Sadie couldn't focus on it. She was too busy watching the figure she had spotted hanging back in a shadowed doorway. Neville's facial expressions were hard to read. Sadie was fairly certain that she saw longing mixed with doubt. There were a few brief flashes of determination when he started to step forward, but it always faded into resignation as he slunk back. He finally left all together, and the only name Sadie could put to the expression on his face was loss.

Sadie knelt beside the fire place and quickly kindled a small blaze. She fumbled around on her desk until she came upon the still sealed parchment that contained her questions about Neville. She placed it in the grate and watched as the flame caught. She wasn't sure she could even explain why she had done it. She just had the sudden utter conviction that whatever had or had not happened between Luna and Neville, it was nobody's business but their own. She didn't want to see it. Despite everything she knew, there was still something about the thought of Neville and Luna that left a feeling of the final pieces of a puzzle sliding into place in her heart.

It made no sense, but it was what it was. She had no desire to watch the demise of something that was past mending, and she wasn't going to let anyone else gawk at it either. The room was feeling stuffy despite it being midwinter, so Sadie pried open her window. She managed to have impeccable timing as Adrienne's owl came swooping through the gap.

10 February 2038

Sadie,

I don't know what you are thinking, and I don't care that Drake told me to leave you alone. If you aren't present and accounted for by the time he leaves the MOMPO at 8, you are not the friend I thought we had.

Adrienne

Portkey Office? What would Drake be doing at the Portkey Office? With a sudden sinking feeling, she dove back into the pile on her desk until she found the note from the Boots. She tore it open and ran her eyes down the page. It was an invitation, but it wasn't for dinner. It was for a party. Her eyes focused on select phrases as she tried to force her swirling brain to form coherent thoughts. "Good-bye Party" stood out along with "3 years" and "continent travels."

He was going away for three years, and no one had told her. That wasn't a fair thought. They had tried, but she had been too wrapped up in her self to pay any attention. The flood of memories rushed in on her with such speed she thought she might choke on them. They all had one thing in common. They all featured her and Drake – late night study sessions when Adrienne had given up and gone to bed, sitting next to each other cheering at Quidditch matches, dancing together after graduation – and something she had never realized before was suddenly as clear as the reason Adrienne had sent her the stack of pictures. It took all of 20 seconds of basking in the glow of her new knowledge for the doubt to creep to the forefront. He was leaving. It was a wonderful work opportunity. She shouldn't interfere. It wasn't the right time. He might not even feel the same. She might not even feel the same. What if she was just emotionally overwrought and didn't want her friend to leave? What if she was just being selfish? Her mental back and forth was halted when her eyes found the clock – 7:37.

The next item to register in her vision was smoke. It was coming from the howler that the office owl had just dropped in her lap. Her boss's voice had never sounded so grim.

MISS CREEVEY! YOUR BLATANT DISREGARD OF YOUR EDITOR IS NOT ONLY UNPROFESSIONAL BUT COMPLETELY INEXCUSABLE. YOU WILL BE IN MY OFFICE WITH ALL YOUR COLLECTED SOURCE MATERIAL, DRAFTS, AND REVISIONS BY 8 P.M. FOR A MEETING WITH MS. SMITH AND MYSELF. YOU WILL FOLLOW DIRECTION AND FINISH THIS PROJECT TO OUR SPECIFICATIONS OR YOU WILL NOT ONLY FIND YOURSELF OUT OF A POSITION; YOU WILL FIND YOURSELF NO LONGER EMPLOYABLE IN THE ENTIRE PUBLISHING INDUSTRY.

Sadie had no idea what Constance had said to provoke such ire, and she didn't have time to figure it out. The clock changed to 7:40. She had to make a decision, and she had to do it on impulse.

The door slammed closed behind her leaving a flurry of papers slowly settling to the floor and a pile of ash swirling in the grate.


End file.
